I'm hoping it's just the lack of nearby grocers in between "twee" and "mega-mart," but I haven't seen "seasoning ham" or just old-fashioned rough ham on the bone for a long time.
The first was usually a jumble of scraps and pieces that had been closest to the smoke, extremely well-suited to adding a bit of umami depth to home-made bean soup; the latter was the generic, non-canned "ham" of my youth, usually served in hot slabs or slightly thinner cold slices, and decidedly not "honey-glazed," "maple-smoked" or "Black Forest," those being the kinds of things that show up at our closest grocer's deli counter these day; nor was it the too-uniform, barely-textured (and nearly flavorless) pink stuff that can be found cubed, diced, sliced and whole at the Big Giant Store of Everything.
At least the tiny, "foodie" grocery has some variety, and last week, they actually had "ham off the bone" (said so right on the label) in their grab'n'go meats. I grabbed some for myself and what do you know? It's the good old stuff. I hope they intend to keep it in stock.
Maybe they'll even have some "seasoning ham" by the time the weather turns chilly enough to simmer a pot of bean soup all day!
Update
4 days ago
4 comments:
FWIW, I can get both pork hocks and salt pork here. Maybe a regional thing (I am in Oklahoma), or maybe, like you said, a lack of a middle ground where you are. In my town there is a "one off" grocery (the only one of its kind) that carries both, and a small regional chain grocery that I *think* carries pork hocks.
I don't used salted/cured meat much any more (salt restriction) but if you're making baked beans from scratch, it's kind of a necessity, and I find that smoked hocks or salt pork is generally better than what passes for bacon these days (and the price of bacon, holy heck. I bought some to cook up for a baked potato feast I was helping prepare for the college kids and...wow, I didn't realize how expensive it had gotten recently, since I almost never buy it)
Oh, you poor, sad thing.
down here in Cajun country we have 'tasso' - pronounced "Tah-so" - which is basically seasoned and smoked pork that ISN't a ham. If you get the good stuff from a local smokehouse/butcher shop, it does everything that old-style country ham USED to do to a pot of beans.
I'm under the impression that a lot of supermarkets have stopped having "meat cutters" to cut, prepare, and package meat in the stores and instead do that centrally -- so instead of the "waste" being something for the store meat-packer to do, it is created in more industrial quantities somewhere far from the store and there are probably other markets in the food industry for such quantity.
In a previous locale we were fortunate to have a hipster butcher shop nearby, and lately we live down the street from a smokehouse/restaurant/bar that is happy to sell such stuff to us.
I miss our old smokehouse. We used to do our own hams. Sigh...
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