Kiwi lamb could become ham

New Zealand's quintessential lamb roasts - a favourite holiday fare worldwide - could be profitably re-packaged and branded as a unique Kiwi ham, researchers say.

"If Italy can have a parma ham, why can't New Zealand have a Lorneville or Hastings lamb ham?" said Mustafa Farouk, a researcher at AgResearch's meat industry research centre, Mirinz, in Hamilton.

"Who knows, maybe Rangiora or Te Awamutu ham could be on the supermarket shelf soon?

"Lamb ham can be promoted as a unique New Zealand product and could find its way to restaurant menus as a Kiwi cuisine, alongside crayfish, green mussels and Canterbury lamb," he said yesterday.

Booming tourism in New Zealand offered a chance to introduce the product internationally, as some of the two million tourists who visit annually would take home with them a taste for Kiwi lamb ham.

Dr Farouk, who proposed the lamb hams in an article written with colleague Alaa El-Din Bekhit for the Food New Zealand journal, said one advantage of using lamb would be that it did not suffer any religious taboo.

Parma ham from Italy, huelva, guijelo and jamon serrano from Spain, pastirma from Turkey and Greece, and jinhua ham from China were niche products fetching high prices worldwide.

"New Zealand is already well-known as a leading lamb producer and it is rich in ingredients that are unique, which can be used to create a genuine `Kiwi' product".

Flavour could be modified by feeding the lambs different fodders, or enscapsulated plant oils. Additional flavourings could include kawakawa leaves, horopito (New Zealand pepper), and korengo purple seaweed, or hangi flavours and extracts from puha, or even a manuka woodchip smoke.

"The possibilities are many," said Dr Farouk.

To achieve a high-quality product, there would need to be changes to improve the tenderness of lamb legs through conditioning techniques using electrical stimulation of the meat, and storage for particular times and temperatures.

A suitable leg conformation could be achieved by hanging the carcass from the pelvis instead of the legs, or "hot boning" immediately after slaughter and restructuring the leg shape before rigor mortis set in.

- NZPA