If you needed any evidence that the company Cinco Jotas produces the finest form of the most exclusive cured ham, Iberico Bellota, a tour through the company’s facility in the Andalusian city of Jabugo provides it. Down in the temperature controlled, brick walled cellar where 20,000 hams at a time are hanging from the ceiling in the process of a three-four year aging process is a section belonging to Spain’s royal family. Apparently, someone at the palace was summoning a ham for Christmas the day I was there as the experts were going through a complex process of testing it to make sure it was ready.
This final stage is only one step in what is a long, rigorous process to produce the unique, absolutely delicious flavor of this ham—sweet, slightly nutty and marbled with fat but, surprisingly, a good fat: the omega 9 filled unsaturated fat similar to olive oil. (Meaning: it’s advisable to eat the fatty sections not cut them away even for the most health conscious.) That fat—and the ham’s flavor–comes from the purebred Iberico pigs’ diet composed mostly of acorns which they consume for a three month period in winter called the Montanera (exceeding the law which stipulates a two month acorn period to be called Iberico ham).
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