Jamón de Trevélez

Appearance & taste

The ham is round and has its rind and foot. When cut it is red and glossy, and there is fat marbled into the muscles. The meat is tender and tastes slightly salty. The fat is soft, yellowish white and glossy and pleasant in taste.

The salt content is at most 5 %. It is measured on a cross-section sample 4 cm from the head of the bone, no later than one month after the ham meets all requirements. The label reads “Indicación Geográfica Protegida ‘Jamón de Trevélez’”.

Production

Only legs from crosses of the Landrace, Large White and Duroc-Jersey breeds are used, from castrated boars or from sows. The legs weigh more than 11.3 kg fresh and, depending on their weight, have a layer of fat under the skin of at least 1, 1.5 or 2 cm. Their pH must be between 5.5 and 6.4. On arrival in the curing rooms they are 1 to 3 °C inside.

They are cured with sea salt without additives, matched to the size of each leg. The ham should absorb exactly as much salt as it needs to stay stable and mature for a long time. Curing, washing, resting, drying and maturing take place in the area. During maturing, the producer moves the hams to the parts of the drying rooms whose temperature and humidity suit them best and opens or closes the windows. In this way the ham matures slowly in the fresh air. The nitrite additives E 250 and E 252 and other additives are not used.

Origin & history

The area covers the altitudes above 1,200 metres in the municipalities of Trevélez, Juviles, Busquístar, Pórtugos, La Taha, Bubión, Capileira and Bérchules. All lie in the Sierra Nevada National Park and belong to the Alpujarra Granadina. The area belongs to the cold zone, with plenty of snow in winter and cool summers; holm oak forests and many plants found only here grow there. Altitude, temperature and humidity determine the maturing and the microflora of the ham.

The ham has been made in the Alpujarra for over 200 years. Writers such as Pedro Antonio de Alarcón mentioned it in the 19th century, and according to the specification so did Cervantes. The writer and thinker Gregorio Marañón said that an Andalusian gazpacho lacked only a few cubes of Jamón de Trevélez to be almost perfect. The most important document is considered to be a privilege of 12 October 1862: Queen Isabella II made Trevélez an official purveyor to the court, and the hams were allowed to bear the royal seal. According to the specification, Eugenia de Montijo, the wife of the French Emperor Napoleon III, also introduced the ham at the French court.