the holy grail

Check out this Washington Times travel article featuring Spain and jamón ibérico through the eyes of a foodie. The article reaffirms my observations about Spain's obsession with ham and my (reluctant) admittance of the choice meat's deliciousness...

The Holy Grail


Here's a sneak preview...

    "My husband is a foodie who's obsessed with ham. First it was salty country ham from Virginia. That was followed by a prosciutto phase. Then a taste of Spanish ham had us on a plane headed to Madrid.
    Spain loves ham as much as my husband does. Every tapas bar, no matter how humble, has at least five hams -- with hoofs attached -- hanging from the ceiling in the midst of humanity, cigarette smoke and flying insects.
     Classic Spanish ham -- jamón ibérico -- is a lot like Peking duck. It's been savored by a culture for centuries, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture doesn't think it's safe to bring into this country -- unless you have the proper paperwork. As a result, it's rare to find it in America, and when you do, it's jamón serrano at $200 a pop.
     Jamón serrano whetted our appetites for the primo ham you can't get in the States -- the renowned jamón ibérico de bellota from Jabugo in southwestern Spain, where free-range black pigs eat the sweet acorns -- bellotas -- that make those hams so prized. "That's where we're going," announced my husband, Steve, determined to journey to the heart of jamón country.

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Our first stop was, no surprise, a ham store. Despite our deficient language skills, Señor Paco Jara of De Jabugo la Canada was adept at explaining why the Jabugo region produces the best ham. The hams are cured in salt one day per kilogram -- "No mas," he said. That means a 20-pound ham leg would be salted for fewer than 10 days, compared with, say, a Smithfield-type ham, which is in salt for more than a month. 

Everyone we met around town expounded on why Jabugo hams are the best. Some credited the dry, mountainous micro-climate of Jabugo. "If you take the same pig to Seville 100 kilometers away," said [our translator], "it would taste different."

Others cited the natural process and lack of preservatives other than pure sea salt. Before the days of refrigeration, hams were kept in cellars to cure, and even now, many locals hang hams in their cellars every fall. Said our Conservas Jabugo guide, Ignacio Contreras, of the elaborate computer-controlled refrigeration of his plant: "This imitates an ancient cellar. Nothing is new in the process."

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Click on the link above to get the full dish on Andalucían ham.