Double Smoked Ham is on ..

20 lb Smithfield ham, injected with double recipe of Sweet Kiss of Death injectable marinade 'thru mfr's cryovac', scored top and into BGE for apprx 10 hrs.starting at 225*F and slowly increasing temp. Going for 135*F internal. Has drip pan of diluted inject below.
Went with BGE and lots of pecan and cherry chunks throughout the lump (Royal Oak and Sonoran Mesquite). I'll get better temp stability for most of the cook .... if lump load starts to die out I can quickly fire up the Traeger and finish it up. I love having 2 cookers!

Plan to baste in last 2 hrs of so with 'reduced' inject .... unless someone thinks that is a bad idea. Should have planned better, won't be ready until around 8 or 9:00 tonight.

Merry Christmas to all !

it was like a sprinkler near the end .... wifey is not talking too much right now (especially not things I can post) .. :roll:

beerguy said:

I thought the basting was with the maple syrup concoction. Thats how i did mine monday. it came out great.

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It is and I used it on my 'test' cook but that was not injected. Maybe I can add some maple syrup, cider vinegar, worcestershire to the inject and get closer ... oops ... coffee powder too!

Done a bit early!

Only about 6 hours for this whole (20lb) ham to reach 135*F. That's about 18 min per lb. Internal temp was accurate and cooking temps (225*F slowly raised to 280*F) were as directed. Seems like a whole ham_ injected_cooks faster than the 25-30min per lb in the recipe.
First meal was very good. Inject flavor was present but not overpowering. The best is yet to come since we started at the shank end and made the whole meal working back along the bone. Too early to set any firm opinions, but so far, so good! Will comment later when sampling the 'prime cuts'.

Some final thoughts ....

Brauma said:

Looks great Tommy. Please report back after you get into the body of the ham and get into more of the injection. I may not do the injection next time because I thought it was too sweet.
I had the shower experience too. That sticky stuff was squirting all over the kitchen. Lucky for me wifey didnt see it and I cleaned it up right away.

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Really glad I tried it ... I feel the 'whole' ham version needs some fine-tuning since it seems like the original was developed with 1/2 hams (especially shank).

I doubled the injection/marinade formula (assuming it was devised for a 1/2 ham) and injected all of it .... however a large amount ended up in the pan afterward and was used as a last-hour baste. Tried reducing some of it down for a table sauce and it was too thick and strong.

The result was pretty good .... subtle, slightly sweet effect throughout the ham, the butter pecan extract flavor comes through nicely yet not at all overpowering. I did use the orange extract, but the bottle was almost empty and had been around a long time .... no negative impact.

I feel this is a unique way to prepare a holiday (special event) ham, not as much trouble as I expected, and a darned good result .... just not as impressive as I anticipated.

It would be great if others continued to refine this cook, especially using whole hams, to find some tricks that would really kick it up a notch.

The BGE temp control was excellent and kept the product quite moist. I did place a drip pan below, cooked indirect using the BGE ceramic 'plate setter' to buffer heat from below, and a liberal number of pecan and cherry chunks throughout the mixture of R.O and Mesquite lump.

An earlier test cook was done on the Traeger 075 with a 1/2 ham and the 'cut' side got a bit dry. I wish now that I had reversed the process and done the 1/2 ham on the BGE and whole ham on the Traeger.

Long-winded wrap-up .... but I hope it helps some who are considering this cook soon. This final pic is the remaining center portion ... saved the best for last! Well .... maybe, tonight we had Thirdeye's Great Northern Beans after a long cook with some of those great meaty bones!

Neil said:

I did two 15 #er's in the 'dera on Christmas and both came out great. I stuck cloves in each square of the scoring and sprayed with leftover injection marinade. I also glazed it once the internal temps hit 125*. I was able to maintain pit temps of 225-250 throughout the cook and they were both done within 15 minutes of eachother. Total cook time was 5 hours. I started cooking hams this way last year and will never cook anorther one any other way again.

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Neil, did you use essentially the injection formula in the 'double-smoked ham' recipe posted here several times ( butter pecan extract one ) ? My result was good, but subtle, so I'm guessing that lots of different injections will do well.

Jeff_in_KC said:

I used a boneless ham because we were pushed a bit for time but it turned out fantastic! I just scored where the indentations were from the "net" after injecting the sweet kiss of death marinade through the cryo-wrap. Brushed on the coffee/maple sauce 4 times during the cook.

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That really looks good and 'boneless' sure makes life easier when serving. I will add that option based on your pics and comment. I guess there are times for both ways.

Thanks,