Anyone ever smoke a fresh ham?

I've never done one, but have one in the freezer so I'm curious how it comes out.

I was under the impression that if you don't brine it, it will come out like a ham from the store that you slice.

You have to brine it for it to shred like pulled pork.

As I said, I've never done one though.

i did one last yr for Xmas if i remember right it was around 14# i brained it for a couple days and injected it also the day of the cook
I have a Weber kettle and used the snake method, cooked at 220* or so until it reached internal 160* (about 8 hrs)
1 tip is to make sure you keep adding liquid to the pan in the bottom of the smoker so it doesn't dry out
finished with the glaze, just mix over med heat and i placed it in the oven for a couple mins on high broil

Brown Sugar Honey Glaze
1 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup honey
1 Tablespoon dijon mustard
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

yeah it was gifted to me so i had to make the best of it, its worth the effort IMO, but hell even a precooked ham is great on the smoker

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What smoker?

I am interested too. I have been looking online and several great ideas.

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I'm using a Green Mountain Grill Jim Bowie. I've got the wifi model, so I setup a profile. I'm gonna cook it to 193, then have it kick up to 450 for 20 minutes, then down to 150 to keep it warm (unless I'm awake when it finishes).

I just kept it simple. I had some Byron's butt rub, and put it into pineapple juice and injected it. Then I sprinkled the rub on the exposed meat, and then a little on the skin (probably not necessary).

I'll try to remember to grab a pic when it's finished.

Fresh ham is the uncured, un-smoked rear leg of the pig. It will cook up with flavor like a pork loin if cooked as is. It's going to be more lean than a fatty front shoulder/butt.

Many recipes call for scoring the skin of a fresh ham and brining it for a few days, to get some flavor in there, before cooking.

Cook's Country has an episode "How to Make South Carolina Smoked Fresh Ham and Smashed Potato Salad" that is free on Youtube. Their results with the ham look damned good. LINK

City ham or wet ham. To turn that fresh leg into what we ordinarily think of as ham, you would need to cure it (with curing salts and seasonings in a water solution that is kept in a certain temperature range) for several days, then smoke it. That is what is called a city ham or wet ham, and it's what you see at the store 99% of the time. Not all are smoked, but most are.

Country ham (aka Virginia ham) is less common around here. It is made by dry curing the leg with a dry cure mixture, smoked in a smokehouse, then aged at 75-80°F or higher for a few months to more than a year, with perhaps a little mold forming on it. You see it wrapped in burlap sacks around the holidays. It requires soaking in water before baking, frying, etc. It is salty AF.