Ham in Coca Cola

It is incumbent on me, after many long days of roiling about politics and religion, to pause and address a matter of great and life saving importance.

Ham, O best beloved, in Coca Cola.

Probably everybody already knows about this. Indeed, I did know about it. It was always there, nestled in one of my Nigella books, in a section about Trashy Food. I would pass over it in my rush to get to Chocolate Pots, for which, even though I make them pretty often, I can never remember the proportions. You turn the pages, lingering over vibrant and alluring images of chocolate bars battered and fried, some sort of gorgeous oozing sandwich, and various mentions of Elvis Presley.

But the ham. There it is, in the book, and there is me, usually saying to myself that I’m not much for it, that it doesn’t draw me in, I can take it or leave it, but probably mostly leave it.

Ham is ubiquitously Christian. A Sign of our freedom in Christ (someone should alert Trump so he can indulge his new found Liberty) it is there for every funeral, and often for a wedding, including my own. Can a Christian die and there not be ham? You can usually find me at a funeral luncheon gazing at the ham with a piece of bread in my mouth, applying more butter to the remanent in my hand. “Oh! Have some ham!” someone will say, and I will nod and crinkle my eyes and promise that I’m getting to it. But really I’m backing imperceptibly away, trying to decide how indelicate it would be of me to shove another bun into my pocket.

But Aldi happened to have an incredible sale on ham shortly before Christmas. I was arrested in my journey between the avocados and the cheese. There it was, like, what, a few cents a pound? It would have been sinful to walk away from anything that cheap, given the amount of everything my children eat. And I was fretful and overwhelmed, it being nearly Christmas. So I hauled one out of the bin, and, availing myself of a massive bottle of Coca Cola, toddled home in the usual way.

So what you do is, according to Nigella, you take the ham, you shove it in a big pot, and then you pour the Coca-Cola all over it. That’s it. I’m not kidding….well, you do have to put it on the stove and turn on the stove. But still. That’s All It Requires. It took me thirty seconds to remove the ghastly wrapping, and some other number of seconds, endured to the sound of a child freaking out over all the wasted soda, to pour that dark elixir all over it. Then I turned it on and walked away.

I mean, just consider with me for a moment. There is a food out there, in this great and terrible world, that can be taken out of its packet and anointed with Coke, a food, in other words, that takes under a minute to “prepare”. I mean, there you are, it’s the ghastly and terrible supper hour, everybody is angry and crying, you’re trying to weigh in your intelligence the amount of time it will take to chop a lot of onion and what, mushrooms? Garlic? Chicken that has to be separated from its skin and bones? You start at a reasonable time but the vagaries of reality will ensure that within 45 minutes you will be angry, exhausted, and, worse yet, staving enough to eat your own hand.

Into this vast and wretched culinary landscape, the landscape of Supper Pulled Out of the Fridge in sorrow and exasperation, let me commend to you the Ham in Coca Cola.

Because, not only does it take thirty seconds to fling into a pot, you then walk away and do something else for an hour or two or three, it doesn’t really matter, it’s not like it’s going to go bad. On the contrary, the more it simmers in Coke, the more the salt and the sugar join themselves together in something so divinely ordained, yes, I will bring in the Holy Spirit, it’s as if God himself comes into your kitchen to make it all ok. It’s Delicious. It’s so delicious. Once you extricate it from the broth, thinking that maybe you will shove it in a 500 degree oven with brown sugar lathered all over, you can’t keep from just tearing bits off, burning your mouth and fingers, weeping with joy over the simplicity of what lies before you, and how good it tastes. You stand there in the dawning and profound realization that you needn’t even bother about the bread. More also, time you allotted for the oven disappears, and you just plunk it out on the table, and there it is, rosy, fat, entire in itself.

So there you are. I hope I’ve solved all your problems forever. Have a lovely day, if you enjoy that sort of thing.