Prob a thread for Irish input, but AIBU to not know why only gammon in UK, no bacon?

[DoTheHop]

Does anyone know the difference between bacon and gammon?
I googled and it said it comes from different parts of the three little piggies.
But what's the difference exactly?
If you're Irish and living in the UK, have you adopted the gammon?
It looks paler maybe to me and maybe a little tougher in some respects.
When cooking, I boil it, like I would do with bacon and it seems similar but just not quite the same?

Can anyone butcher/Irish/English who knows their cuts of meat enlighten me on this British phenomenon?

For the UK posters, I've never really seen gammon on sale in Ireland, and vice versa for the UK?

I do think that some of the cheaper bacon/raw ham joints in the UK are made up from pieces of bacon.

A proper gammon joint is great boiled and then finished off in the oven.

I wonder this too.

I've had turkey and ham (gammon joint boiled then roasted) every year for xmas and I'm in scotland. Sometimes we have goose instead if turkey, but we always have a ham.

Boil it in Diet coke ?!!!?!!!?
What's the point of that??
You need to use full fat so it carmelises in the oven afterwards

@DoTheHop we do ham and turkey on Christmas Day/Boxing Day (English but DM is half Irish).

I think you'll find gammon a good substitute. Our local butcher does a joint of bacon. It is a bit fattier and a cheaper cut than gammon, but not as cheap as the Danish gammon in the supermarkets. I have found it harder and harder to get the gammon joints I used to buy - no marbled fat within but a nice layer of fat over the top. I like to cook it the old fashioned way- boil and skim, score and stud with cloves and coat in English mustard and brown sugar. Most supermarket gammons don't have enough fat to score and the cooking instructions suggest roasting without boiling first, which makes for a drier, saltier roast.

If you cook gammon, you have to put rounds of pineapple from a tin on it. It’s the law. gavel

I thought boiling bacon with parsley sauce and pease pudding was a classic English dish?! It's obviously not much cooked these days, because finding bacon joints hidden amongst the gammon in the supermarket is not easy (not that I've looked recently). I've cooked the same thing with gammon and it tastes yummy - it's all pig, after all...

Gammon is the back leg,, cured and the same joint as you use for your turkey and ham dinners in Ireland.
It is large muscles, so lean, apart from the layer of fat on the outside, which is usually trimmed off after cooking.
Boiling bacon is cured belly and back rolled up and tied into a joint.
Back and belly (also collar and middle, but seldom seen these days) is also sliced into bacon rashers.
I haven't seen boiling bacon for sale here, only in Ireland, so would go for gammon, but don't do the second cook in the oven, just boil and serve.

God this thread is confusing...

Sometimes you can get collar which is bacon and also hock but not sure if that is bacon or gammon. Our local butcher sells slipper or horseshoe gammon.

My mum used to get bacon ribs for making soup but I can’t say i’ve ever seen that around in supermarkets.

Hock is gammon, its the smaller bottom joint of the leg. Just above the trotter. Picnic ham is cured shoulder, just to further muddy the waters!

I'm in England and can get bacon joints at the two nearest supermarkets (Asda and Co-op), bacon chops too which are like a really, really thick slice of bacon. Gammon rounds which are like perfectly circular slices of gammon and the butcher sells horseshoe gammon. We get ham shank for soups.

A bacon joint is just the big joint you would slice pieces of bacon from. It’s the whole piece. In Ireland that’s what we have when people talk about bacon and cabbage. You can boil it or roast it in the oven and it’s delicious served with creamy mashed potato and veg.

I grew up in an Irish family and we had ‘bacon and cabbage’ now and then. I always assumed the ‘bacon’ was the same thing as what the Brits call ‘ham’ at Christmas. It looks and tastes the same to me.

From (Queen) Deliaonline

A bacon joint is a piece of cured pork, made with any cut of meat, unlike gammon. Correctly, gammon is the hind leg cut from a side of bacon after curing and traditionally the cure should be the mildest, but we are getting into the habit of calling any bacon joint suitable for boiling and baking a piece of gammon.

So go to a butcher and ask for a bacon joint.

I use a gammon joint for boiled bacon, cabbage then cooked in the bacon water, which is the best bit. It's what my mum would do, she's Irish but lived in England for about 40 years.

I'm doing my Christmas gammon cooked in cider with peppercorns, allspice berries, bay leaves and onion in the slow cooker, then finishing that off in the oven with a nice Christmassy glaze.