Chef Thomas
Anchovy Sauce
A proper white sauce sharpened with pounded anchovy, the old Georgian trick for waking up a piece of poached fish or a slice of roast lamb on a Sunday in spring.
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Ham Stock from a Gammon Bone
Created by Chef Thomas
The deeply savoury liquor left behind after a gammon joint, given a second life with its own bone and a few honest aromatics, into the one stock that makes a pea and ham soup taste like itself.
Sauces & Condiments
British
Batch Cooking
Freezer Friendly
10 min
Active Time
2 hr 30 min cook•PT2H40M plus cooling total
YieldAbout 1.5 litres
There's a quiet moment the morning after you've boiled a gammon. The kitchen still smells faintly of smoke and sweetness. The meat has been carved, some of it eaten, the rest wrapped and pushed to the back of the fridge. And on the hob, in a big pot, sits the cooking liquor with the bone half-submerged in it, looking like nothing much. This is where most people make their only mistake of the evening. They pour it away.
Don't. This liquor is the closest thing home cooking has to gold. Amber, smoky, deeply savoury, already seasoned for you by the gammon itself, it wants nothing more than an hour or two of gentle attention to become the best stock you've made in a long time. Drop the bone back in. Add an onion, a carrot, a bay leaf. Let it simmer. That's the whole recipe.
The finished stock has one obvious destination: pea and ham soup, thick and green and tasting of winter. But it makes a lentil soup sing, it turns a pot of white beans into something worth sitting down for, and a mugful with a knob of butter and a grating of pepper is a quiet, salty comfort on a cold afternoon when you haven't worked out what to eat yet. I wrote it down in the notebook years ago: 'Boxing Day stock. Never throw it away.' I still think that's one of the more useful sentences in there.
One warning. Don't salt it. Ever. The gammon has already done that for you, in quantities you didn't agree to. Taste as you go and remember that this is a stock that wants to be diluted into other things, not sipped neat.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
gammon bone
Quantity
1
with any clinging meat and skin
reserved gammon cooking liquor
Quantity
about 2 litres
onion
Quantity
1 large
halved, skin on
carrot
Quantity
1 large
roughly chopped
celery
Quantity
1 stick
roughly chopped
leek top (optional)
Quantity
1
green part only
bay leaves
Quantity
2
parsley stalks
Quantity
small handful
black peppercorns
Quantity
1 teaspoon
cold water
Quantity
to top up if needed
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| gammon bonewith any clinging meat and skin | 1 |
| reserved gammon cooking liquor | about 2 litres |
| onionhalved, skin on | 1 large |
| carrotroughly chopped | 1 large |
| celeryroughly chopped | 1 stick |
| leek top (optional)green part only | 1 |
| bay leaves | 2 |
| parsley stalks | small handful |
| black peppercorns | 1 teaspoon |
| cold water | to top up if needed |
Equipment Needed
- •Large heavy stockpot or saucepan
- •Fine mesh sieve
- •Square of muslin or cheesecloth (optional but useful)
- •Large ladle or slotted spoon for skimming
- •Storage tubs or freezer bags
Instructions
- 1
Skim the fat
Set the pot with the cooking liquor and the bone back on the hob, or tip everything into a clean stockpot if it's easier. You'll see a layer of fat on the surface, golden and glossy. Skim as much of it off as you reasonably can with a large spoon or ladle. Don't fuss about catching every last trace. A little fat in a stock is flavour; a thick slick is grease.
If the liquor has sat in the fridge overnight, even better. The fat will have set into a solid pale disc on top. Lift it off in one piece and save it in a jar. It's wonderful for roasting potatoes. - 2
Add the aromatics
Drop the onion halves in, skin and all. The papery skin gives the stock a deeper colour and a roundness it doesn't get from peeled onions. Add the carrot, celery, leek top if you have one, bay leaves, parsley stalks, and peppercorns. The bone goes back in if it isn't already there. Top up with cold water if the liquid doesn't quite cover everything. You want it all submerged, not drowning.
- 3
Simmer gently
Bring the pot up to just below a simmer. You're looking for the occasional lazy bubble breaking the surface, not a rolling boil. A hard boil pulls the fat back into the stock and turns it cloudy. Let it tick along gently for two hours, maybe two and a half. Skim any grey foam that rises in the first twenty minutes, then leave it alone.
The stock is ready when the kitchen smells unmistakably of ham and bay, and the liquid has deepened from pale gold to proper amber. Trust your nose. It knows before you do. - 4
Strain carefully
Turn the heat off and let the pot sit for ten minutes to settle. Strain the stock through a fine sieve, or better still a sieve lined with a piece of muslin, into a clean pan or bowl. Discard the spent vegetables and aromatics, but keep the bone back for a moment. If there's any soft, sticky meat still clinging to it, pick it off with your fingers once it's cool enough to handle. Save it for the soup you're about to make.
- 5
Taste, cool, and store
Taste the strained stock carefully. It should be deeply savoury, properly salty, faintly smoky, with a roundness from the bone and the onion skins. If it feels too aggressive even for a soup base, dilute with a splash of water until it settles. Let the stock cool completely, uncovered, then refrigerate. Any remaining fat will set on top overnight and can be lifted off in a clean disc the next day. Portion into tubs or bags for the freezer once it's cold.
Freeze some of it in an ice cube tray for small flavour hits: a cube or two dropped into a risotto, a gravy, a pot of beans. Pop the frozen cubes out into a labelled bag so they don't quietly disappear to the back of the freezer.
Chef Tips
- •Never add salt to a ham stock. Not even a restrained pinch. The gammon has done the seasoning for you, probably more generously than you'd have chosen, and the stock will be reducing into other things that need their own salt to come through at the end. Season the soup, not the stock.
- •If you didn't save the cooking liquor, or your gammon was roasted rather than boiled, you can still make a decent ham stock by simmering the bone with the same aromatics in plain cold water for three hours. It won't have quite the same depth, but it's a world away from binning the bone.
- •This stock is intensely savoury, so think of it as a seasoning as much as a base. In any recipe that calls for chicken stock, try using half ham stock and half water and see what happens. Lentil soup is the obvious home for it, but a pot of braised cabbage, a dish of white beans, or a risotto on a Thursday night will all thank you for it.
Advance Preparation
- •The stock keeps in the fridge for up to five days. Lift off any fat that sets on top before using, and give it a quick sniff before reheating to make sure it's still sweet.
- •Freezes beautifully for up to three months. Portion it into quantities that match the way you actually cook: 500ml tubs for soups and stews, smaller pots for flavouring, a tray of ice cubes for a splash here and there.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 240g)
Calories
35 calories
Total Fat
1 g
Saturated Fat
0 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
1 g
Cholesterol
5 mg
Sodium
950 mg
Total Carbohydrates
2 g
Dietary Fiber
0 g
Sugars
1 g
Protein
5 g
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