Jamón is perhaps the most famous food product of Spain. Don’t get me wrong, I’m partial to a good thick piece of proper bacon, and Yorkshire ham is nice, as is my Mum’s boiled ham with eggs. Prosciutto is good, great even. However, you have to give it to the Spanish. Jamón is the best in the world; that melt in your mouth, rich and juicy, more flavour in a divine slither than is rationally possible. This is why it is the worlds most widely traded ham, and the ham that fetches the highest prices. However, not all jamón is created equally, and the definitions can be difficult to navigate. So here is a quick jamón 101.

Jamón ibérico alongside other dried and cured products in a Spanish deli.

The jamón of the highest quality, and price, is known as jamón iberico bellota. This comes from the rear legs of the Iberian black-footed pig, which has lived a life outside in at least 1 acre per pig of wild oak forest. The diet of acorns which the pigs feed upon gives the jamón a rich marbling of fat and a distinctive oaky taste, a taste of the forest, and one that pairs particularly well with oaked white or red wines.

Sellers will keep the hooves on the legs of jamón so that you can tell the type of pig that the ham is made from, with the best being a pata negra (black foot). There are cross-breeds of domesticated pig with Iberian pigs, and hams made from pure domesticated pigs which are cheaper. These are simply known as jamón or jamón serrano.

Hams made from the front legs of pigs are produced using the same processes but are not called jamón, but instead are known as paleta. There is less meat on a front leg, or shoulder, than from the rear legs, which do more of life’s work. However, I find that the flavour and marbling of fat in a paleta is equal to that of jamón, and usually more affordable.

Another variable on flavour, price and quality, is the way that the pigs are fed. A distinction is made between cebo (grain-fed and housed), cebo campo (grain-fed wild) and bellota (acorn-fed wild).

There are a few Denomination Origen (D.O.) restrictions that specify exactly how legs are processed and where this is done. There are four areas renowned for their extensive dehesa or acorn forests. Look out for D.O.P. Jabugo, D.O.P. Guijuelo, D.O.P. Dehesa de Extremadura or D.O.P. Los Pedroches. There is a complex labelling system in place for the best jamóns with black label and red label being the best.

The legs are salted and then cured in hanging rooms for between 8 and 60 months. The longer that a leg is cured, the saltier and firmer the meat, the darker the colour of flesh and the richer the flavour. Through the long curing process various chemical changes are taking place in the legs. The salting and drying creates an environment that protects the outside of the leg and draws out moisture. In doing so bad microbes are leached out, and the selected good microbes are left. These microbes get to work denaturing proteins and increasing glutamate content which gives us that rich, delicious umami flavour which makes us remark “wow” or “oh, my sweet porky Lord”.

They say that the best jamón should be cut by hand and always be served at room temperature, not fridge-cold, so that the fat instantly melts onto the warm tongue and coats your excited mouth with deep, rich, refined flavour.

Jamón Ibérico - The Best Ham in the World?

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