I love a good prosciutto and a slice of pata negra, but one of the best hams I have ever had was one I made at home, from a local wild boar. A hind leg of about five kilos (11 lb), salted, hung on the Meatdryer hook and left alone for five months. When I sliced it, it was deep red, firm and sweet, with fat that melted on the tongue.
Wild boar is a free-range pig in the truest sense. It lives its whole life outdoors, roams for its food and eats what the forest gives it: roots, grasses, insects and, in autumn, acorns and beech nuts. That is close to how the pigs behind Spain's finest hams are raised. The best jamón ibérico, labelled bellota, comes from pigs that spend their last months eating acorns under the oaks.
Cure wild boar meat slowly and you get a ham in the same family as the great ones, at a fraction of the price. Here is how to turn the leg into a prosciutto and the jowl into a guanciale.
Why wild boar has a bad name in some countries
In North America feral hogs are an invasive species, and across Europe boar numbers have grown so fast that they are treated as a pest. They root up fields, crops and gardens overnight, and hunters are encouraged to shoot more of them. The meat has a reputation to match: lower grade than pork, sometimes gamy, and a lot of it ends up as mince or forgotten in the freezer. Most of that is undeserved. A wild boar is a pig, the same species as the farmed pig, which was bred from it. Its meat is darker and leaner, its fat firmer and its flavour deeper. Some boar does taste strong, and a big old boar has that reputation. But handle wild boar meat well, and especially if you cure it, and that taste is rarely what you get.
What to do with wild boar meat
Treat the carcass the way an Italian or Spanish butcher treats a pig. The leg becomes a ham, the belly a pancetta, the jowl a guanciale, the neck a coppa, and the trimmings and shoulder go into salami. Our guide on how to cure wild game maps every cut to what it becomes. Here I'll take the two that reward you most: the whole leg and the jowl. Everything else for curing game at home is collected in one place.
Wild boar prosciutto: how to cure a wild boar leg
Making prosciutto from wild boar is no different from making a Parma-style ham from a farmed pig. A whole hind leg, skin on and bone in, is packed in coarse salt, kept cold while the salt works its way in, then rinsed, sealed and hung to air-dry for months. You can't call it a Parma ham, that name is protected, but you can make the same thing.
The boar leg has one big advantage: size. A Parma leg weighs around 15 kg (33 lb) and takes well over a year. Mine was a third of that, and leaner, so it dried faster. It was ready in five months. Time follows weight and humidity, though, so the calendar is only a guide. The hook weighs the leg every day and tells you when your air-dried wild boar ham has lost enough water.
The full method, from choosing the leg to slicing it, is in our guide on how to make prosciutto at home. In the app, the Smoked Paprika Serrano recipe takes a pig or a wild boar leg and follows the Spanish route, with smoked paprika rubbed over the leg before it hangs.
Wild boar guanciale: how to cure the jowl
Guanciale is the cured jowl, the fatty cheek of the pig, and it is the original ingredient in carbonara and amatriciana. On a boar the jowl often goes out with the head. Don't let it. It is one of the fattier pieces on a lean animal, and it makes a guanciale you won't find in any shop.
It is also the quickest win on the animal. Our app recipe, Hammerman's Guanciale, comes from Jörg, a German master butcher. It is written for a pork jowl, and a boar jowl is cured the same way:
- Trim the jowl into a clean, even piece and weigh it. The salt is measured as a share of that weight, so the scale comes first.
- Rub it with salt, black pepper, garlic, rosemary, thyme, juniper and bay, vacuum-seal it and cure it in the fridge for one to two weeks, turning it daily.
- Rinse, dry, coat it thickly in black pepper and hang it at around 12–15°C (54–59°F) and 70–80% humidity.
- It is ready when it has lost about 30–35% of its starting weight. The hook tells you when you get there.
Slice it thin for a board, or cut it into strips and render it slowly for pasta.
A word on safety. Wild boar can carry trichinella, a parasite that a cured ham or guanciale will not kill, because neither is ever heated. So have every animal tested before you cure any of it. In the EU, boar meat that is sold must be tested by law, and in some countries the test is free for hunters. Freezing is no substitute: veterinary authorities warn that freezing does not reliably kill the parasite in wild boar. Wear gloves, keep everything clean and use a net against flies. Curing and eating meat is always done at your own risk. If you are unsure about anything, don't eat it.
Wild boar questions, answered
Is wild boar meat good to eat?
Yes. It is lean, dark and full of flavour, and a well-handled young animal is excellent. It is also one of the best meats there is for curing, because the leg is small enough to dry in months rather than years.
Is wild boar the same as pork?
Same species, different life. Farmed pigs were bred from wild boar. The boar lives outdoors, moves all day and eats what the forest gives it, so its meat is leaner and darker and its fat firmer than farmed pork.
Why does wild boar sometimes taste gamy?
Partly the animal: a big old boar can taste strong. Partly the handling: meat that was not cleaned and cooled quickly after the shot picks up off flavours. And partly the cooking: lean meat treated like fatty pork dries out. A younger animal, handled well and cured, rarely tastes gamy at all.
Does wild boar need to be cooked through?
Fresh wild boar, yes. Veterinary advice is to heat the whole piece to 68°C (154°F) right through. A cured ham or guanciale is never cooked, which is why the trichinella test comes first.
Does freezing kill trichinella in wild boar?
Not reliably. Veterinary authorities warn that freezing does not reliably kill the trichinella found in wild boar, so it can't replace the test.
How much does a trichinella test cost?
It depends on where you live. In some countries it is free for hunters, in others you pay a lab fee. Your hunting association or veterinary authority will know what applies.
Is wild boar healthier than pork?
It is leaner than most farmed pork, because the animal has to work for its food. Beyond that, we leave nutrition claims to nutritionists and stick to what it does on the hook.
Shop the essentials
Everything you need to hang a boar leg or a jowl and know when it's ready.
- Meatdryer Hook – Tracks weight, temperature and humidity and tells you when your ham or guanciale has reached its target.
- Accessory Hook – Holds a heavy leg steady on the Meatdryer for accurate measurements.
- Protective Net – Keeps flies and insects off the meat for as long as it hangs.
