Celebrate Ham Week with an Australian ham

Posted by Nicole Eckersley on 1st July 2011

Australian Pork Ltd’s annual Australian Ham Week, 3-10 July, kicks off again with the winners of the nationwide quest to name the country’s very best Australian ham.

APL, the national representative body for pork producers, said the week was an opportunity to celebrate Australia’s excellent home-made ham, and for consumers to take advantage of its Australian PorkMark trademarked label to identify wholly Australian pork products.

“Our research shows that 95 per cent of consumers want to ‘buy Australian’ if they could identify it. Current labelling for ham and other smallgoods products can be misleading, or at the least, confusing,” says Andrew Spencer CEO of Australian Pork Limited (APL), the nation’s representative body for pork producers.

“For example ‘Made in Australia’ does not mean the product is made from Australian grown pork, only that it has been manufactured here. But the pink PorkMark clearly distinguishes the Pork as being made from Australian pork – from God’s country, not God knows where.”

The hot pink, ‘fail-safe’ identification sticker allows consumers to easily identify products made from 100 percent Australian pork, produced in line with Australian health and safety practices.

To date, there are over 318 butchers and smallgoods producers licensed to carry the Australian PorkMark on their product.  Since the inception of Australian Ham Week in 2010, the number of licensees nation wide has increased by almost 40%.

Butchers and retailers across the country will be participating in Australian Ham Week with ham tastings and special offers.

The Australian Ham Week winners, judged by fleishmeister Horst Schurger and chefs Paul McDonald and Simon Bestley, are:

Australia’s Best Ham: Westridge Meats, Toowoomba, Qld
Boneless: 1st – Westridge Meats, Toowoomba, Qld; 2nd – Schulz Butchers, Angaston, SA; 3rd -Andrew’s Choice Smokehouse, Laverton North, Vic
Traditional Bone In: 1st – Barossa Fine Foods, Elizabeth West, SA; 2nd – Grays Modern Meat Mart Toowoomba, Qld; 3rd – Thompson’s Fresh Foods, Hobart, Tas