How to choose a ham offers tips, tricks and advice on purchasing ham.

• Choosing a ham can be confusing. While ham is essentially just the haunch of a pig, it can be cut, cured and prepared in a myriad of different ways before it even reaches your local market. The following guide to choosing a ham aims to take the mystery out of your future pork purchases.

• Choose a ham based on the following criteria:

1. Number of Guests: How much ham you buy will depend on how many people you plan on feeding. If you plan on purchasing a large ham, be sure you have a pan big enough to hold it. If not, consider buying two smaller hams.
2. Time for Preparation: You'll need a couple of days to soak and cook a country-style or dry-cured ham, but reheating a pre-cooked wet-cured ham only takes a few hours.
3. Cost: The quality of the meat can add to the cost of the ham.
4. Occasion: If you're buying a ham for a holiday dinner, you'll want to steer away from hams labeled "ham and water product."
5. Ease of Carving: Choose a bone-in ham for additional flavor. Choose a boneless ham for easy carving.

• Hams vary according to their cuts and how they've been prepared. When choosing a ham, you'll want to take how many people you plan on feeding into account as well as how much time you have to prepare the meat.

1. Fully-Cooked Ham: Ham that has been heated through the middle to temperatures exceeding 147 degrees F. Ready to eat without further cooking.
2. Partially Cooked Ham: Ham that has been heated through the middle to temperatures exceeding 137 degrees F. Requires additional cooking.
3. Uncooked Ham: Ham that requires cooking to eat.
4. Boiled Ham: Ham that has been boned, cured and cooked using a boiling process. Ready to eat without further cooking.
5. Whole Ham: A cut that includes both butt ham and shank ham from the pig's leg. Weights 10 to 20 pounds. Available bone-in or boneless.
6. Butt Ham: A cut taken from the top half of the pig's leg. Contains more fat than a cut from the shank, but has more meat and is easy to carve.
7. Shank Ham: A cut taken from the bottom half of the pig's leg. Contains less fat than butt ham, but is not as meaty and is harder to carve. Has a slightly sweeter flavor than butt ham.
8. Spiral Sliced Ham: A precooked ham that has been pre-sliced in a spiral or continuous cut.
9. Wet-Cured Ham: A wet-cured or "city" ham has been cured with a brine. The majority of hams available in grocery stores are wet-cured.
10. Dry-Cured Ham: A dry-cured or "country" ham has been rubbed with a salt or sugar seasoning, dried and aged. The most common type of dry-cured ham in the United States is a Virginia or Smithfield Ham.