What better way to start the day then with some coffee-laced redeye gravy and a hearty ham steak!
Ham and Redeye Gravy is a hearty breakfast traditionally made in a cast iron pan designed to charge Mom and Dad for a hard day of work. But it is also popular with campers as an easy eye-opener. Ham and coffee are the core ingredients, but there are variations on the theme.
Traditionally they are made with country ham, a dry brined American ham, but many people find these to be a bit too strong and funky. I prefer this recipe with a wet cured city ham or even thick cuts of Canadian bacon. Redeye Gravy can also be made with dried beef, a progenitor of chipped beef on toast or “shit on a shingle” as it was called by WWII soldiers. In Louisiana it is sometimes made with chickory instead of coffee, and I have even heard of it being made with cola or Dr Pepper. Bleeah.
When you cook it the traditional way in a non nonstick pan, the ham will make a little fond, the brown bits that stick to the pan, but the ham cooks so quickly and has so little fat, there is no real advantage to cooking the meat in the pan, so I prefer to grill it (I know you are shocked to hear that), make the gravy on the side, and amp up the flavor a notch. If you like, make some biscuits, split them open, lay the cooked ham on top, and spoon the gravy over.
For something a little different, also be sure to check out our balsamic and brown sugar glazed ham steak.
Classic Redeye Gravy And Ham Recipe
Makes:
Takes:
Ingredients
- 1 wet cured pork (see note below)
- 2 tablespoons bacon drippings or unsalted butter
- 2 tablespoons all purpose flour
- 1 cup black coffee
- 2 teaspoons dark brown sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon hot sauce
These recipes were created in US Customary measurements and the conversion to metric is being done by calculations. They should be accurate, but it is possible there could be an error. If you find one, please let us know in the comments at the bottom of the page
Method
- Cook. Place a small sauce pan on medium heat. Toss in the bacon fat and when it is melted sprinkle in the flour. Whisk them until they are blended together, there are no lumps, and it turns the color of peanut butter.
- Turn down the heat to medium low, add the coffee, sugar, black pepper, and hot sauce, and whisk. Cook until the coffee begins to thicken and it reduces to about 1/2 to 2/3 cup (64g to 85g). Taste and adjust the seasonings. You can add salt if you want, but remember the meat is salty.
- While the sauce is thickening, grill the ham steak. Remember it has already been cooked so you only need to heat it to 145°F (63°C), and that shouldn’t take long. If it is almost done and the sauce hasn't thickened and reduced, turn the heat under it up.
- Serve. Plate the meat and spoon some gravy over it. Serve immediately.
High quality websites are expensive to run. If you help us, we’ll pay you back bigtime with an ad-free experience and a lot of freebies!
Millions come to AmazingRibs.com every month for high quality tested recipes, tips on technique, science, mythbusting, product reviews, and inspiration. But it is expensive to run a website with more than 2,000 pages and we don’t have a big corporate partner to subsidize us.
Our most important source of sustenance is people who join our Pitmaster Club. But please don’t think of it as a donation. Members get MANY great benefits. We block all third-party ads, we give members free ebooks, magazines, interviews, webinars, more recipes, a monthly sweepstakes with prizes worth up to $2,000, discounts on products, and best of all a community of like-minded cooks free of flame wars. Click below to see all the benefits, take a free 30 day trial, and help keep this site alive.
Post comments and questions below
1) Please try the search box at the top of every page before you ask for help.
2) Try to post your question to the appropriate page.
3) Tell us everything we need to know to help such as the type of cooker and thermometer. Dial thermometers are often off by as much as 50°F so if you are not using a good digital thermometer we probably can’t help you with time and temp questions. Please read this article about thermometers.
4) If you are a member of the Pitmaster Club, your comments login is probably different.
5) Posts with links in them may not appear immediately.
Moderators