This Plumcot Holiday Ham with Butternut Squash is slow-baked with my mother’s homemade plumcot preserves. Any good-quality store-bought plum preserves (jam or jelly) will do just fine if you can’t find home-canned–the best! I happen to be partial to my family’s home-canned produce, especially that of my mom’s because hers is superb!
The squash is exceptional with this ham.
If you want an incredibly moist (tender to boot) dinner ham, cook for 6 hours at 275 degrees. Don’t follow the directions on the package–be contrary as I happen to be. You won’t regret my bullheadedness! Besides, don’t you want meat that simply falls apart because it’s so tender with a bounty of delicious flavor? This is the way to eat pig, bone-in–necessarily needed to compliment the meat for more moistness and good natural flavor.
Choose a hickory-smoked ham.
In a large roasting pan, place the ham face-down, and make sure that the entire content of water from the package is included–because it’s already got some ham drippings in the water in which it was packaged. 
In a saucepan on the stove, heat 1 1/2 to 2 cups plumcot preserves with 1 diced or slivered yellow onion, 1 apple, and 1 freshly squeezed lemon.
Add 2 tablespoons unsalted butter–because there’s plenty of salt in the ham… Sprinkle some black pepper.
Add 4 or 5 whole cloves.
Stir in some honey, just a little. When the contents are heated, taste it for personal preference as to whether or not you wish to add more honey.
Pour half the amount over the ham. Reserve the remaining half for the butternut squash. Place the roasting lid crooked or slanted over the ham for coloring while it slow-bakes. Place in the oven and don’t check it until a few hours–then baste and continue to baste on the hour from then on… Then when it gets closer to the 6-hour mark of cooking, baste every 15-30 minutes, always being sure to keep the lid cracked open slightly.
Slow-cook the butternut squash, as well–2 hours in from the time the ham begins cooking. The rind will soften and be filled with the same flavor and spice; edible.
Be sure to wash the squash and cut off any bad spots. 
Remove the seeds.
Spoon the fruit sauce in and over the squash slices in a casserole dish.
Loosely cover with aluminum foil and place in the oven with the ham to slow-cook.
Like the ham, spoon the cooked fruit sauce periodically over the squash. Carefully turn the slices so that they don’t fall apart while evenly cooking them in the sauce. For more coloring, remove the aluminum foil during the last hour of cooking.
Three-fourths cooked… almost done.
Allow the meat to set for 15 minutes before tearing from the bone to serve.
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