Ok a bit of a risk I know for a relative beginner, but having bought a 40 kg half pig for bacon & sausages I was at a loss what to do with the leg ! Tempted at first to cut in into joints & freeze it but in the end, took off the fillet end, boned it & used the pump & rub method to cure, this I have done successfully before no problem. The remainder of the leg was a large lump - 9 kg & I decided to cure it as it was, bone in. I deducted a guestimated 1.5 kg for the bone, then calculated the total cure required & used just 20% as a rub, due to only exposed flesh being the area where the fillet was severed. The remainder I made into a 6% of meat weight brine mixture & flavoured with bay & honey & injected it, then bagged it & removed air. I tried some as gammon last night & it tastes very good, so am quite pleased with myself Question is...Cutting the gammon steaks with the bone in ? The way I did it seemed wasteful - I cut vertically down the bone from both sides & then cut the steaks from both sides giving me just under a half section of the cross section area (hope this makes sense?) This however left a fairly large rectangular lump of gammon either side of the bone !
Is there a better way of cutting with the bone in, or is removal a better deal & then slice?