This Bourbon Glazed Ham is basted and topped with the most amazing sweet and savory maple bourbon glaze then baked to perfection. If you are looking for a flavorful, juicy ham, this recipe is for you. Serve it for a holiday like Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, or even Sunday dinner.

 

Baked Ham is great year long but, most only think to make it for holidays like Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter. Maybe it’s because without a flavorful glaze, ham can be pretty bland and often can become dry if not baked properly. Let me introduce you to my Bourbon Glazed Ham. It will quickly change your mind about the dry and basic ham from your childhood Christmas dinner. This glazed ham is like no other. It’s juicy as well as both sweet and savory.
Consider serving your holiday ham with Red Skinned Mashed Potatoes or Old Fashioned Sweet Potato Casserole.

For this ham recipe I prefer to use a bone-in ham. I have not tried this bourbon glaze with a spiral sliced or boneless ham. The bone really helps retain the moisture and flavor needed to keep it juicy and flavorful. If you are looking for a great spiral sliced ham recipe, consider making a CopyCat Honey Baked Ham.

The way to achieve the BEST Baked Ham is mastering the basting process which is so simple, it just involves a bit of babysitting. Brushing your ham with the easy to make Bourbon Ham glaze every 30 minutes allows the flavors and juices to layer through the ham. It also creates the delicious and tasty caramelized crust (my favorite part).

The flavor combination used in my Bourbon Glaze is perfect. Will it taste like a glass of bourbon? No, the bourbon technically cooks out of the glaze. But, the bourbon flavor will mingle with the maple, brown sugar, orange juice, and other spices. The end result is a unique and rich flavored impressive ham.

Bourbon Glazed Ham Ingredients

You’re not going to need many ingredients to make the Bourbon Ham Glaze for our recipe today. It’s kind of crazy, just throwing a few glaze ingredients together in a pot and making a delicious ham with it! Give our ingredients list a quick peek to see if you’ve got any missing ingredients:

• Shank Ham – Also sold as ham shank, bone-in ham, and half hams. A spriral ham can be used but, you will need to keep it covered with foil through the baking process and it will most likely not need to bake for quite as long. Be sure that the ham you are using is pre-cooked.. Double-check and, if you have a raw ham, cook it before starting this recipe.
• Whole Cloves – Get a fresh container, since you’re going to need a lot of cloves. Avoid ground cloves.
• Brown Sugar – Light brown sugar is what I used for this recipe
• Apple Cider Vinegar
• Dijon Mustard – Do not use any sort of English or yellow mustard here. You need to use dijon mustard.
• Garlic Powder – Garlic powder or granulated garlic. Whichever ingredient you prefer.
• Worcestershire Sauce
• Maple Syrup – You will not need fancy maple syrup or really good maple syrup to make this recipe work. That being said, don’t grab Hungry Jack butter syrup or the cheap stuff you throw on your pancakes.
• Bourbon – The best bourbon for ham glaze is… whatever bourbon you’ve got, usually. You shouldn’t be spending $60-70 or more on a bottle just for this recipe- don’t go using Pappy Van Winkle here- but avoid “well” or cheap bourbons just as much. We made ours a Woodford Reserve bourbon ham glaze but you could use other brands like Maker’s Mark, Knob Creek, or Jim Beam.
• Orange – Grab a fresh orange for this recipe, since we need the orange zest and juice. In a pinch, bottled store-bought orange juice could work.Just note that the zest adds a depth of flavor.

See recipe card for quantities.

How to make Maple Bourbon Glazed Ham

Making a glazed ham with bourbon from scratch is, naturally, going to be a bit more work than a store-bought ham with a flavored packet or getting one from somewhere like Honey Baked Ham. There’s a little bit of extra prep and hands-on work but, once you get a bite of that delicious tasty and extra juicy meat, you’ll realize the work is worth it. Our recipe is really easy to make- just follow along with the step-by-step guide below:

• First, we have to do a bit of prep. Let your ham sit on the counter to come up to room temperature while you remove the top rack from your oven and get it preheating to 325 degrees. Once you’ve got a room temperature ham, remove the overwrap, transfer to a roasting tray or pan, and pat dry with paper towels.

• Grab a sharp kitchen knife and start diagonally slicing about 1/4″ deep across the surface of the ham, making your way through the fat. You’ll eventually end up with a sort of diamond pattern.

• Off to the side, grab a zester or microplane and use it to grate the zest off the orange– avoiding getting too much of the white pith underneath. Once you’ve got a fully zested orange, cut it in half and juice thoroughly.

• Back with the ham, poke the whole cloves into the corners of the diamond pattern. Repeat with as many corners and cloves as you have in diamonds. I believe we had around 50-60 cloves in our ham.

• Finally, we can make the bourbon glaze: to a medium pot, add your brown sugar, vinegar, mustard, garlic powder, Worcestershire, maple syrup, bourbon, orange zest and juice. Begin cooking over low heat (low and slow), stirring frequently to help dissolve the sugar.

• Eventually, the sugar will dissolve and you’ll have a consistent ham glaze. Remove from the heat and start brushing top of ham with glaze.

• Once you’ve got an even coating of bourbon glaze on ham, flip it over in the roasting pan so the cut side is facing down. Add a cup of water to the bottom of the pan and then transfer to preheated 325 degree oven. Let bake 20 minutes for every pound ham weighs, brushing with leftover glaze about every 30 minutes.

• If the bottom of the roasting tray dries out, add 1/2 cup of water to moisten back up. After roasting for 4 hours for our 12 pound ham, we pulled from the oven and let rest 10 minutes before slicing. Serve up and enjoy!

Storage / Freezing

Storage: Let your ham cool completely before you think about storing it. Once cooled, transfer the slices to a ziploc bag or an airtight container and move to the fridge. Leftover ham should keep for 3-5 days, maybe even 6 if you store it well enough.

Freezing: You can also freeze ham if you want to store it for longer. Let cool completely and transfer slices into a freezer bag before squeezing out any excess air and putting in the freezer. Your frozen ham should last 3-4 months, but taste and texture will be best within the first 1-2 months.

Consider these Side Dish Recipes

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3 Ingredient Cranberry Sauce

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Au Gratin Potatoes

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Brown Sugar Glazed Carrots

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Red Skin Mashed Potatoes