Maple-Dijon Glazed Ham with Brown Sugar Crust

(note: symbol wrote this, I'm just posting it)

Found a smoked ham in the freezer that had come out of its butcher's paper and was getting a bit freezer burned. Figured I might as well throw it on the grill with whatever veggies we had on hand and call it a dinner.
The link is to the recipe I used as a guide.

3-4 lb. smoked ham (didn't weigh it but giving it a heft, I'd put it at ~3 lbs.)
1/2 c. maple syrup
2 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. rum (would've used bourbon if we'd had any on hand)
1 Tbsp. mustard (I used some of my home-made Roman-style mustard)
1 whole clove, ground
3/4 c. brown sugar

1. Pre-heat your grill and set it up for indirect heat. Since my ham was pretty dried out, I also tossed a roast pan full of water on the direct heat side of the grill to add a little steam. If you've got a nice, fresh ham you probably don't need to bother with the water/steam. I started my grill out fairly hot (~500F) but dailed it down to 300F or so once the meat was actually on.
2. Combine the maple syrup, butter, rum, mustard, and ground cloves.
3. Once the meat's had a couple hours on the grill, heat up the glaze to melt the butter.
4. Brush the ham all over with the glaze. Cook for 10 minutes or so, then give it another coat, press on the brown sugar, and cook for another 20-30 minutes. Yum!

Black Garlic & Chorizo Carbonara

From the PC website, with some modifications. This is "carbonara" in the sense that it's pasta with meat and eggs, but the pancetta is replaced with chorizo and mascarpone and black garlic are added, leading to a very different flavour. It's still delicious.

Deviations from the recipe as written are using whole eggs instead of egg yolks, using "chorizo sausage" rather than actual chorizo because I'm a doofus and got the wrong thing from the grocery store, and adding a post-mixing cooking stage because without that it turned out pretty slimy.

Ingredients

• 3 large eggs
• 128mL mascarpone
• 256mL freshly grated parmesan
• 500g spicy pork "chorizo" sausages
• 1 bulb black garlic, thinly sliced
• 500g dried spaghetti
• salt and black pepper

Procedure

1. In a wok, whisk together the eggs, mascarpone, parmesan, some salt, and a generous amount of freshly grated black pepper.
2. Peel and break up the sausages. Cook in a saucepot or deep skillet over medium heat until cooked through.
3. Add the garlic. Cook, stirring, until fragrant, ~3 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, boil water and cook the spaghetti.
5. When cooked molto al dente or even a bit harder than that (say, 75% of the rated cooking time), drain, reserving >500mL of the cooking water.
6. Immediately add the pasta and 375mL of the water to the pot with the sausages and garlic. Toss together until the pasta is at the desired firmness and the water mostly absorbed.
7. Pour the whole thing into the wok with the eggs and cheese.
   At this point, if all went according to plan, the heat from the pasta and sausage will set the eggs until they are less of a sauce and more of a delicious coating clinging to the pasta and sausage.
   In practice, I find things don't usually go according to plan, leaving you with pasta swimming in slimy egg glop. Which is why we used a wok here.
8. Swap out the pot for the wok and cook, tossing and stirring, until the eggs set and the sauce reaches the desired consistency.
9. Eat.