Paul & Lauren’s Travels

Like all great, traditional food products from Emilia Romagna, Parma ham is a simple product that has been prepared masterfully and slowly. We took a lead from our friend Alfonso and went for a drive into the hills of Parma in search of the secrets behind the most famous of Parma hams, Prosciutto. As it turned out, we were given a personal tour of the multi-million factory by the owner and founder himself.

We’re all familiar with a leg of ham, but the Italians go one step further and carefully age the ham for up to 24 months. The end result is a rich, luxurious and flavoursome ham that is long lasting and entirely delicious.

The legs of ham are stored in a series of large fridges at low, but not freezing, temperatures. Initially they are salted, but after a few weeks the salt is washed off and a long, slow process of drying begins under the careful eye of the factories owner. To ensure that ham doesn’t become too dry, fat is smeared over the open end of the ham on a few occasions.

At the end of our tour we sat in the lunch room drinking espresso and listening to the owner recount his tales of how he began the company and perfected his style of production. In true Italian style he somehow managed to frequently return to comparing the process of making Parma ham to wooing a beautiful woman!

We left the factory with the aroma of prosciutto in our noses, a strong feeling of welcome and a handful of the bosses own special salami.

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 18th, 2009 at 12:42 am and is filed under Food and Produce, Italy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.