Double-Duty Heavenly Citrus Ham

The year ends. 2024 becoming 2025. I sit in the kitchen on New Year's Eve and I think about what this year held: the bar mitzvah, the book progressing, the daily visits continuing, the grandchildren growing, the writing deepening, the chain holding. The year held the "you look beautiful" and the "what's for dinner" and the "chag sameach" — three windows, three moments of Marvin surfacing from the disease, three seconds or three minutes or twenty minutes of the man I married appearing behind the veil and saying something that made me believe he is still in there, still Marvin, still mine.

I made brisket for New Year's Day. The constant. The anchor. The prayer. The recipe unchanged since Sylvia gave it to me, which is forty years now, forty years of the same onions and the same garlic and the same tomatoes and the same broth and the same six hours at low heat, and the sameness is not monotony, the sameness is fidelity, and the fidelity is the love, and the love is the brisket, and the brisket is the chain, and the chain does not break.

I am sixty-seven. I am a grandmother, a writer, a cook, a caregiver, a widow-in-training (a phrase I hate but which is accurate). I am the keeper of Sylvia's recipes and Irving's silence and Marvin's windows. I am the brisket lady at Cedarhurst and the soup lady at the support group and Bubbe in four kitchens. I am Ruth Ellen Feldman, and I am not done. The year turns. The brisket braises. The chain holds. Not today. Not ever. Not in this kitchen.

The brisket is mine and Sylvia’s and Marvin’s — it belongs to the chain, and I do not share that recipe lightly. But when people ask what else goes on a New Year’s table built for continuity, for abundance, for the kind of meal that says we are still here, I tell them about this ham: citrus-bright, deeply glazed, filling the house with a smell that makes everyone wander into the kitchen. It is the kind of dish that works twice — festive enough for the holiday, sturdy enough to carry through the week in sandwiches and fried rice and quiet lunches — and that double-duty practicality is its own form of wisdom.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 2 hours 30 minutes | Total Time: 2 hours 50 minutes | Servings: 12

Ingredients

1 bone-in fully cooked ham (8–9 lbs)
1 cup fresh orange juice
1/2 cup honey
1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon orange zest
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Whole cloves for studding (optional)

Instructions

Preheat and prep. Heat oven to 325°F. Place ham cut-side down in a large roasting pan. If desired, score the surface in a diamond pattern about 1/2 inch deep and stud each diamond intersection with a whole clove.
Make the citrus glaze. In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine orange juice, honey, brown sugar, Dijon mustard, orange zest, lemon zest, ginger, cloves, and cinnamon. Stir and bring to a gentle simmer. Cook 8–10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until slightly thickened. Remove from heat.
First glaze and tent. Brush about one-third of the glaze generously over the ham. Tent loosely with foil and roast for 1 hour 30 minutes.
Glaze and roast uncovered. Remove foil. Brush ham again with half the remaining glaze. Continue roasting uncovered for 45 minutes, brushing with the last of the glaze every 15 minutes, until the surface is deeply caramelized and an instant-read thermometer registers 140°F at the thickest part (not touching bone).
Rest before carving. Transfer ham to a cutting board and let rest at least 15 minutes before slicing. This allows the juices to redistribute and the glaze to set.
Make it double-duty. Reserve the pan drippings — strained and defatted, they make a bright citrus pan sauce. Leftover ham keeps refrigerated up to 5 days and freezes beautifully, ideal for soups, fried rice, or sandwiches through the week.

Nutrition (per serving)

Double-Duty Heavenly Citrus Ham — A New Year’s Table That Holds the Chain