On Thanksgiving Day many Kentucky families will gather around the dining table, and for some, the menu will include country-cured ham.
This is the story of one Kentucky family that’s made and sold country hams for three generations.
At Penn Country Hams in Taylor County near Campbellsville, the workday starts before sunrise. It’s still dark on a Friday morning as workers arrive.
Inside a large concrete floor room, they are rolling plastic tubs full of one and two-day-old hams out of a refrigerated room.
A couple of workers take each ham and rub it all over with a salt and sugar dry mixture. This is the beginning of a curing process that will last four to six months.
General Manager Blake Penn, 42, oversees the aging process. He’s the third generation of the Penn family to make and sell country hams, starting in 1959.
Blake learned about country hams at an early age. “I was a rambunctious little guy. So, I would get into everything. So, to keep me calm, they would let me sharpen knives and debone ham. When I got off the school bus, I could take a femur bone out of a pig's leg at 12 years old.”
Blake’s grandfather, Donald Penn, grew up on the family farm in Taylor County. Donald remembers when there was no electricity on their farm as a child. With no refrigeration, they kept hams in salt for months.
Blake says, “in the old days, they would take a ham and they would kill it in the Winter, like a hog, and then they would salt it. Then that salt would cause water to drain out of the ham, and as it got into the Spring, that temperature variation would slowly get the ham drier, until it got into Summer. So that they had the meat, and it was able to be kept without refrigeration.”
Blake’s grandfather Donald is now 89 years old and has a home right in front of the main company building. Asked how he would describe the taste of a salt-cured country ham, Donald said, “Yeah, it's a little salty and it's a rich (y) ham flavor. See, every part of the ham has a different taste. I'm a real big ham eater. I like it.”
Fortunately, the age of electricity meant the family farm finally had refrigeration which plays a key role today in aging country hams. After the hams are rubbed down with salt they are moved gradually through a series of temperature-controlled rooms.
First, the hams go into a cure, or “Winter room” that’s 38 to 42 degrees.
After one month the hams are brushed and washed, covered with a netting around them, and hung in the equalization, or “Spring room” where it’s 55 degrees.
Then the hams are moved to the aging room at 70 to 85 degrees. It takes about four to six months to complete the country ham aging process.
Blake says, “It's a very, very artisan product, time-consuming, and it reminds me a lot of like the bourbon industry and how they age their product. You know, we're looking for certain flavors and aromas over time periods, and people that have tasted that, and really appreciate it.”
Blake says it’s hard to describe the flavor of a country ham that’s aged for months. “It's given a more robust country ham flavor to those enzymes that give that a flavor. And the longer that goes on, it's going to become more pronounced in the flavor profile. And I guess my grandpa already said it best to you, it gets more rich. And that's about as close as I can get to that describing that flavor profile.”
Penn Country Hams sells their products that include sausage, jerky, and bacon in a retail area of the company in Taylor County, and online. On a large sign outside the company the Penns proudly proclaim they’re “home of the million-dollar ham.”
For many years the Penns have entered their hams in the Kentucky State Fair grand champion competition. In 2019 their 16-pound ham won in the commercial division and was auctioned off for $1 million which went to charity.
Blake says it was a validation for decades of work on the 60th anniversary of the company opening.
“When they actually announced my name, I almost broke down emotionally over it, because I didn't expect it, and I was wanting it really bad, and I've been working really hard for it. So, it was a big, big deal for me. It helped me out a lot, you know, with the recognition and getting a spotlight on the business, and, you know, we've only just excelled since, and I think I see another one coming.”
The Penn family has come a long way since Colonel Gabriel Penn was given a land grant in Kentucky for his military service during the Revolutionary War.
From a family store opened in the mid-1800s in Taylor County to the founding of their country ham business in 1959, the Penns have helped feed countless families.
It’s a legacy that Blake Penn appreciates and feels. “I have a campsite up on the hill that I built. We camp with my family, like me and my kids and stuff, and sometimes friends. Sometimes I'll be sitting there early in the morning, and I can see over the whole farm here, up on the hill, it's like I can feel everybody.”
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