Uncooked gammon in fridge

[ilovetosleep]

We bought an enormous gammon to feed 16 for Christmas Eve from the butcher. It's dated as sold on 21/12 and vacuum sealed. But I was too poorly to host and we cancelled, it's still in the fridge as no room in freezer. Would it still be ok to cook tomorrow? Food standards website says 3-5 days for uncooked gammon but that sounds very cautious, its a massive joint. What would you do?

[SeamusMacDubh]

Normally gammon has a date of about 2 weeks or more on it, doesn't it? If it's vacuum sealed then it should be okay, I don't know though and don't want to be responsible if it's bad and makes you ill!

[Floralnomad]

I purchased a gammon joint in the supermarket just before Christmas and it’s use by date is Jan 6th , so if it looks ok and smells ok I’d cook it .

[Natsku]

Gammon is fairly heavily salted so keeps well so it's probably ok

[yorkshireyummymummy]

It will be fine.
It’s a cured meat so has a longer shelf life.
I got a gammon, large ( about. 4kg) which is sealed like yours on 16 dec and it’s fine until 6 Jan.
When you open it it may have a funny smell - that’s normal. Wait for ten mins and it should be fine. Lots of pre packed meat has an odd smell on first opening.
Check the packaging hasn’t opened at all ie , no air in packag8ng.
So, you have taken it out of packaging, now dry it with some kitchen roll and leave it fir an hour in the kitchen. This raises the temp of the meat so you arnt cooking it from 4c [ it means that it will cook more evenly. I do this with ALL meat]
And ENJOY, Don’t forget, if you don’t eat it all you can freeze it cooked in chunks/ slices. I cut up th3 leftovers to use in chicken & ham pie or quiches and freeze in little portion sized bags.

[ilovetosleep]

Thank you! I'm usually pretty good with meat and not relying on sell by dates, and I am often quite risky, but gammon is something I never buy and know nothing about so thought I should double check! Nowto dig out that cider recipe I found...