Connoisseurs go mad for £1,000 ham Aficionados of pure Iberian ham are apparently fighting to get their laughing gear round one of the few legs of 2006 Alba Quercus Reserve - a jamón ibérico puro hewn from acorn-fed* porkers and cured for two years - which goes on sale next year at a reserve price of £1,000 a leg. For those of you not au fait with Spanish ham, …
Jamón ibérico de bellota is bloody tasty, and no mistake. But I think it needs to be stored and handled properly. Selfridges London do it for £130/kg (IIRC), but the quality is a bit variable - they don't seem to sell enough of it so it dries out too much (and you don't always get counter staff with the requisite cutting skills).
Since this is an IT site, anyone got a URL for a decent mail order supplier?
John
I know it's now legal to use imperial measurements and you won't be chased by pointy-stick wielding EU beaurocrats, but did a Spanish farmer really quote a price per pound? Or did you carefully translate the confusing euro-per-kilo price into the much easier to understand pound-per-pound for the benefit of our backwards nation?
my god, that is obscene. anyone who is a big enough wanker to pay that kind of money for dead pig deserves to choke on it.
As I write this kids over the world are starving to death and yeah you might say this is off topic but in fairness....anyone who pays that kind of money for that is a selfish cunt and I hope they get worms.
so there.
Quick every one there is a real live and dyed red socialist in here..... fetch the torches and pitchforks jethro there's gonna be a lynching.
step one, every comrade must drive a trabant, any other vehicle cannot be justified whilst children are staving.
step two, only amstrad wordprocessors and lg phones are allowed until children stop starving.
step three There will be no more elections (waste of money) until everyone has the same amount of money and opportunity
Step four, and NO rock and roll records, why waste money on Beatles albums and these levi jeans until we have fixed world poverty...
Too easy ... NEXT !
Says the man who typed his message on a computer that he hasn't sold to buy food for said kids.
As was pointed out, its actually not that much over the odds. Sounds like the effort was put into making the ham the absolute best so why should the guy not reap the rewards.
Who is to say that the people buying this ham aren't some of the biggest charity contributors in the world? And have possibly done a whole lot more to combat world poverty and malnutrition than some bloke who likes bitching and moaning about some marginally expensive ham.
Go cry somewhere else.
P.S.
I love ham.
i'd love to try some of this but think of the price of the sandwich..
..you're not exactly gonna bang it between 2 pieces of warbys and bang some hellmanns on it are you ?
so ad another few hundred quid for equally extravagent sandwich requisites :D
and haha@chris taylor, well said mate, what is it with every story of some luxury item you got some sad git whinging on how wrong it is
on the same note, please remember that Wagyu beefs in Kobe are massaged, grain fed, and that they have BEER to drink.
A top whole beef (prize winner) costs around 100 000US$, and it not unusual to have it served in restaurants @ 1US$/gram.
I didn't know about that ham, so I will try and find some for my next VERY expensive entrée...
Sorry mate
Any one who buys 2 loaves of bread and has to throw one away because it goes mouldy is more accountable. This person has wasted food.
Stinking rich toffs who pay thousands are unlikely to waste any, also the pig has been fed on something inedible to humans anyway.
As the 3 stooges say "Put your nose in there porcine"
Speaking as an African I can say that I still don't want to eat your broccoli. Tell your mothers to stop sending it.
If there weren't somebody to buy dead pig at 80 pounds a pound (or whatever) there wouldn't be a job for Ibernian swineherds. Although that sounds like Reaganomics I firmly believe that an upper-class is a by-product of capitalism and a necessary one. The fact that I am not in that upper-class makes me angry and so I want to be a socialist to make them give some to me. But that's not going to happen so I eat normal pig and dream of being a fat cat.
And anyway a great deal of the money Europe sends to Africa gets stolen by people like Allen Boesak or turned into AK-47's. Europeans are viewed as legitimate targets because hundreds of years ago you guys invaded Africa. Hence, a presidential pardon and a continued political career for the convicted fraudster. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Boesak
PS: I am really the uncle of the governor of the reserve bank of South Africa and I know of a secret bank account of a dead politician that I need to get out of the country.... etc etc
"also the pig has been fed on something inedible to humans anyway."
Bellotas can be and are eaten by humans, at least last time I checked I was still alive and kicking. I get one of these acorn fed hams in my works christmas hamper but personally I find the stuff inedible, the bellotas are a lot nicer. On the other hand my mother in law reckons that getting the ham is worth me going to work, but then she doesn't have to go there.
What, are you stupid? Since when did a regular leg cost 500 quid? Clearly only in the crappy resorts that you go to. They must see you walking down the street in your vest and shorts with sweat all over your fat belly and decide to charge you 5 times the normal price.
I can tell you now, a normal ham of good quality in a normal supermarket costs less than €100. I know that because I live in Madrid and I buy one every month. The only people who pay 500 quid are the sweaty balding fat tourists in Torremolinos.
What has changed is that auctioning limited top-quality items via internet actually brings better prices - think concert tickets, celebrity underwear... Ebay is not just a jumble sale.
People used to eat acorns into the 19th century. Dr Johnson reports enjoying acorn puree. Then it was rrealised that the tannins were toxic to human kidneys (not pig's though, no need to feel sorry for them). Is there any unimployed biotechnician out there willing to resurrect the delicacy with a tannin-free acorn?
Oh deary me.
I wrote that post to try and get a few tempers raised specifically because I have of late become bored with the inanity of the comments posted to many articles here on the site.
Since people tend to get angry and try to justify themselves most often when they feel guilty about something, it says a lot about the more vociferous replies I have had.
Just a couple of points:
1. If you want to insult me in my native tongue, spell it correctly.
2. I must have missed the part where I declared myself a living saint when I wrote that post. I never said I was perfect, I just pointed out that it is wrong (and I don't care if your opinion says otherwise; of course you are perfectly entitled to it, but you are still wrong) to pay that much for food when people are starving.
3. http://www.oxfamgb.org/ukpp/poverty/index.htm
4. If you still think I am a whining git, go fuck yourself :)
5. If you can't take my opinion on the chin, see #4.
6. An article about HAM. On the Register. maybe because SPAM is made of animal parts, but really, that's a tenuous connection at best.
Well Peter, it worked, didn't it. How ironic, that my inane post against inanity actually got some non-inane replies.
Plus, and be honest, we haven't seen a decent flame on the Reg in a good while, and whilst mine may not have been great, at least I am trying...
So, my apologies to anyone whose feelings may have been hurt by my spiteful comments, but in fairness, a discussion about ham on an IT site?
Anyway. I'm going back under my bridge.
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