Here's How to Heat a Fully Cooked Ham (2024)

Ham is a holiday essential for many families. The towering centerpiece is all at once elegant, yet comforting, bringing sweet-salty nostalgia to Easter, Christmas, or Sunday supper. To save on time—especially if you're prepping lots of other holiday dishes—you may opt for a fully-cooked ham rather than starting from raw.

Convenient and easy to prepare, a fully cooked ham can be sliced and eaten cold, making it great for sandwiches and salads, but the flavor and texture are even better once reheated. It's a simple process that'll make it look like you spent hours cooking one from scratch.

Helpful Ham Tips

• How to score and glaze the ham—If you are glazing the ham, you might want to score it before baking. This makes for an attractive presentation, and it will allow the glaze to penetrate the meat. Score the surface of the ham in a diamond pattern with a shape knife. For extra flavor, insert a whole cloveinto eachcut intersection or in the centers of the diamonds.
• Applying a glaze after cooking—A glaze may also be applied after the ham is cooked. Increase the oven temperature from about 350 F to 400 F and brush the glaze over the meat. Bake the ham just until the glaze is golden brown. A small ham or ham slice can be glazedand then browned quickly under the broiler. The sweet glaze can burn easily, so check it frequently.
• Make it look fancy—About 30 minutes before the ham is done, arrange pineapple slices over the ham and secure them with toothpicks or whole cloves. Place a maraschino cherry in the center of each pineapple slice, if desired, and secure them with more toothpicks or cloves.
  
• About picnic ham—The picnic ham(or smoked shoulder)is smoked like a ham, but it comes from the shoulder of the animal.It tastes like ham but is not real ham (a true ham comes from the hind leg of the animal). It is fattier than a ham, requires longer cooking, and has more bones.

Steps for Reheating a Fully-Cooked Ham

These instructions apply to hams that are packaged in USDA-inspected plants. Hams that are not from USDA-inspected plants should be heated to 165 F. Check the label for cooking instructions. It should be labeled either "fully cooked" or "cook before eating."

1. Preheat the oven to 350F.
2. Place the ham on a rack in a large baking pan and add about 1/4- to 1/2 inch of water to the pan.
3. If the ham is labeled "fully cooked" (does not require heating), heat it in the oven for about 10 minutes per pound, or to an internal temperature of 140 F. If the ham is labeled "cook before eating," heat in an oven set no lower than 325 F to an internal temperature of at least 145 F.
4. To heat a spiral-sliced ham, place it on a sheet of heavy-duty foil, cut-side down. Wrap the ham tightly with the foil and bake at300 F for about 15 minutes per pound, or until a meat thermometer registers 140F when inserted into the thickest part of the meat, not touching bone.
   
5. If you have a large enough slow cooker, put the ham in it and add about 1 cup of ginger ale, cola, stock, or water. Heat the ham on LOW for approximately 8 to 10 hours, or until the temperature reaches 140F for a "fully cooked" ham or 145F for a "cook before eating" ham.
6. Leftover cooked ham must be reheated to a temperature of at least 165 F. This temperature also applies to hams that come from plants that are not USDA inspected.