This post contains affiliate links.
This traditional Baked Ham recipe with a pineapple brown sugar glaze is so flavorful, delicious, and perfect for Easter, Christmas, or any special occasion!
The Holiday-worthy Baked Ham we come back to year after year.
This is the best Baked Ham recipe with a sweet pineapple glaze that perfectly complements the savory, smoky flavor of the ham. It tastes like something you'd get at a fancy holiday dinner, but it’s incredibly simple to make. Since the ham is already pre-cooked, all we’re really doing is reheating it and adding the glaze, which makes it practically foolproof. One of my favorite parts is the leftovers! I always freeze the ham bone for Ham Bone Soup, and use leftover slices in Ham and Cheese Sliders, Ham Fried Rice, Charro Beans, or even Chicken Cordon Bleu.
What Ham to Buy: My favorite ham is a pre-cooked, bone-in, spiral sliced ham. The bone-in hams are more flavorful and it's nice that it's already sliced. I usually buy the Kirkland hams from Costco – they are delicious and a great price!
If you want more special occasion meals, try Rack of Lamb, Baked Parmesan Crusted Chicken, Seared Scallops, or Baked Salmon!
How to make Baked Ham:
Make the Glaze: Combine all glaze ingredients in a saucepan and stir until smooth. Simmer on low heat until thickened to a syrup-like consistency.
Bake and Serve: Let the ham sit at room temperature for 1–2 hours. Place it in a foil-lined roasting pan, brush with a little glaze, cover tightly with foil, and bake at 300°F for 1½ to 2 hours. Uncover, brush with remaining glaze, increase oven to 400°F, and bake for 15 more minutes. Tent with foil and rest 15 minutes before serving. Serve with Funeral Potatoes or Mashed Potatoes, a wedge salad, and Homemade Rolls!
Baked Ham
Equipment
Ingredients
- 8-10 pounds bone-in fully-cooked, spiral-cut ham
- 20 ounce can pineapple tidbits, , or crushed pineapple
- 3/4 cup light brown sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
Instructions
- Remove ham from refrigerator 1-2 hours before baking, to allow it to come to room temperature.8-10 pounds bone-in fully-cooked, spiral-cut ham
- Make Glaze: Meanwhile, make the glaze. In a saucepan combine pineapple tidbits, brown sugar, cinnamon, and cloves. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium low and simmer for 20-30 minutes or until mixture has thickened.20 ounce can pineapple tidbits, ¾ cup light brown sugar, ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Remove ham from packaging and throw away the glaze packet and the plastic disk that covers the bone.
- Glaze ham: Place the ham flat/cut side down, in a deep baking dish or roasting pan. I like to line my pan with aluminum foil to make for easier clean-up. Brush just a few spoonfuls of the glaze onto the ham, all over the outside. Reserve the remaining glaze for later. Cover the ham tightly with a tent of aluminum foil. This will help keep the ham from drying out.
- Bake at 300 degrees F for 1 ½ to 2 hours, or until internal temperature reaches 110 degrees. Note, the ham is already cooked, so we’re just just trying to reheat it.
- Remove the ham from the oven and remove foil tent (set it aside for later). Increase the oven temperature to 400 degrees. Brush the remaining glaze all over the ham. Return to the oven and continue to bake for another 15 minutes.
- Rest: Remove from oven, tent with foil and allow to rest for 15 minutes before serving.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Text me new recipe ideas!
Simple, tasty ideas sent once a week. No spam.
Follow Me
I originally shared this recipe March 2018. Updated August 2019 and December 2021, November 2023 and October 2025.
I am making this now… I have had the glaze simmering for about half an hour is the pineapple supposed to boil down? Mine doesn’t seem to thickening. Should I keep it going?
Hi Brenna,
It should thicken slightly as it cools but it won’t be that thick! Hope it turned our well for you!
First time making ham! Do I need to soak or boil it to remove excess salt or is that a false belief? Thank you!
My husband raced that this was one of the best hams that he ever ate….flavorful and moist.
We LOVED our variation of this! I used a fresh, cored pineapple from the produce department of the grocery store. Not a lot of juice with it, so I added the juice of one fresh orange and some cranberry juice cocktail (100% juice blend). I sliced the pineapple (leave the core inside while you’re slicing or the rings will collapse). First, I ate a broken slice, just to make sure the pineapple was good, haha. I minced a few slices very finely and added them to the liquid mixture. Didn’t have any ground cloves, so I counted out 8 whole cloves and tossed them in the liquid. OMG the stuff smells SO GOOD while you’re reducing it. Because one of our diners was diabetic, I didn’t want to let the glaze get syrupy and sticky, I wanted her to be able to shake the liquid off the ham if she preferred. I wanted to use part of the ham for pea soup and salads later, so I didn’t want a spiral sliced ham, and didn’t want to glaze the whole ham. So I sliced enough fairly thin slices for about 6 people, and layered them in a glass casserole dish. Covered the ham with pineapple slices. Fished the whole cloves out of the liquid (LOL, IMPORTANT), and poured the thin liquid over the ham and pineapple. Put the cover on the casserole so nothing dries out, and bake about 325 degrees for about an hour, depending on thick your ham layer is and whether you’re cooking something else at the same time. You only have to warm the ham up, it’s already cooked. Our result: wonderfully moist ham, plenty of “juice” for dipping, yummy pineapple rings in an artful arrangement. No sticky cleanup, either!
You say cover the ham tightly with a tent of foil. Isn’t renting supposed to be loose? Like a literal tent just covering it to reflect heat and allow circulation?
Made this for Christmas dinner today and it was DELISH!!! Even though I accidentally turned off the oven early (hahaha), it worked out great. We all loved it. Thanks for the clear explanations.
When you add the tidbit pineapple did you also add the juice, or did you drain the juice?
Undrained 🙂
Trying this for Christmas dinner. Looks good so far.
Another perfect recipe from Tastes Better from Scratch; my only source for delicious recipes!!! The ham was tender and the glaze was the best that I ever made!!!
What an amazing compliment! Thanks so much!!
Silly question but when putting the pineapple in, do you keep the juice or drain some or all?
You don’t need to drain it 🙂
Amazing flavor and the ham was so moist and juicy! Used a boneless ham, cooked for 20minutes per pound at 325F, and didn’t change the temperature for the last 12 minutes with the glazed.