Recipe for Ham Roast

Fully glazed spiral ham on a white platter with carrots, green beans, and potatoes in the background.

4.95 from 38 votes

This Ham Roast recipe creates a tender, flavorful spiral ham coated in a rich honey glaze, making it an easy and delicious choice for any holiday meal.

Prep Time15

Cook Time2

Total Time2 15

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: American

Keyword: Ham Roast, Ham Roast Recipe

Servings:

Calories: 321kcal

Ingredients

8 pound bone-in spiral-cut smoked ham
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 cup brown sugar
¼ cup honey
¼ cup spicy brown mustard
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
¼ teaspoon ground cloves, or ⅛ teaspoon if using whole cloves
1 cup water
whole cloves, optional garnish

Instructions

Remove or lower your middle oven rack in your oven before preheating. Preheat the oven to 325°F. You will need a large roasting pan and an extra-large piece of heavy-duty aluminum foil.
Remove all the packaging from the smoked ham. If it came with a seasoning packet, I typically just discard it. Place the ham into the roasting pan.
In a small bowl, stir together the unsalted butter, light brown sugar, honey, spicy mustard, salt, black pepper, and ground cloves. If you plan to use whole cloves, you can cut back the amount of ground cloves in your glaze to ⅛ teaspoon. Set aside.
Add the water to the bottom of the roasting pan and cover the ham tightly with the large piece of heavy-duty aluminum foil. Make sure that you seal the edges well so that no steam escapes. This helps to ensure that your ham stays moist and heats through evenly.
Bake for about 1 1/2 hours (or all but the last 30 minutes of bake time according to the size of your ham). Remove the ham from the oven and remove the piece of aluminum foil from the ham. Set the foil aside.
Using a pastry brush, brush the glaze over the entire surface of the ham allowing the glaze mixture to drip between the slices of the ham.
If you want to add the optional whole cloves to garnish your ham, carefully and randomly poke the whole cloves into the ham. Place the ham back into the oven, uncovered, for the remaining 30 minutes of cook time. Two or three times during the last 30 minutes of bake time, spoon some of the juices from the roasting pan over the top of the ham to baste your ham and keep it moist.
Your ham should have an internal temperature of approximately 140°F. Allow your ham roast to rest on the counter, lightly tented with the reserved piece of aluminum foil, for 15 minutes before serving.

Notes

You can find these hams in the refrigerated meat section of your local grocery store. They are roughly 8-10 pounds per ham. You will need to allow about 13 minutes per pound of bake time.
You can find larger-sized hams at the big box stores that are roughly 16-18 pounds. They often come already spiral sliced and will also contain a flavor packet. I discard the flavor packet and use the glaze in this recipe. You would need to double the amount of glaze if cooking a larger ham.
Remember, these smoked hams are already cooked through. You are actually just warming them through and flavoring them with this honey mustard glaze. You DO NOT want a fresh ham for this recipe. Fresh hams need special cooking instructions, and while they are delicious, they will not look like the traditional holiday ham that is so famous.
I highly recommend using a disposable aluminum roasting tray and heavy-duty aluminum foil for cooking these hams. I like to place the disposable roasting tray onto a large rimmed baking sheet to make transportation to and from the oven much easier. It is a bonus that it makes clean-up super easy too.
I like to reserve the juices from the roasting pan to spoon over the roasted ham, being sure to get the juices into all those score marks to add extra moisture and flavor to my ham. My family even likes to spoon some of the juices onto their individual servings on their plate, like you would gravy over turkey.
I like to use a standard wildflower or clover honey (like what you can get in the honey bear bottle at the grocery store) for this recipe. When you use the more unique, or gourmet, honey, then their flavors tend to not blend as well with the mustard. This is one of those times when the basic ingredient is the best choice for the recipe.
This glaze is very easy and can be customized with your favorite mustard. I often substitute a dijon or yellow mustard for the spicy golden mustard.
The whole cloves studding the ham is an optional garnish that not only will give your ham added flavor but also makes a beautiful presentation. If you like the flavor of the cloves but not the work or look of the whole cloves, you can just add ¼ - ½ teaspoon of ground cloves to your glaze mixture.

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