Noche Buena Feast is a Filipino family tradition being observe every Christmas Eve and is look forward to by the whole family.
Every December 24 at around 10 pm, a typical Catholic Filipino Family would have attended the Misa de Gallo, a Christmas Eve mass and then will go home to share a midnight feast. So expect that when the clock registers 12:01 AM and the date turns to December 25, ang mga Pinoy will gather around a table laden with lots of specially prepared food for a wonderful meal with friends and family. This meal is called the Noche Buena.
Each household may have different menu for Noche Buena but in almost all table you will find the Christmas Ham, sometimes referred to as Jamon de Bola.
When it comes to popular big brand names, two hams come in mind: Purefoods Fiesta Ham “The star of the Noche Buena Feast” and CDO Holiday Whole Meat “Premium Cut Ham” as endorsed by Chef Rob Pengson. I wonder what you are preparing for your own Noche Buena feast? 😉
These Christmas hams were made from whole meat usually from the hind leg of the pig which makes it leaner, more special but a bit more expensive compared to hams made from different parts of the pig like that of pear shape ham, pineapple ham, brick ham and such. BUT If you compare CDO Holiday Premium Whole Meat and Purefoods Fiesta Ham to the ones available in Kalentong Market and Quiapo such as Majestic Ham, these two are more affordable. Those traditionally made hams retails for P700 to P1000 per piece, the bone-in-leg hams are more expensive.
By the way, Purefoods and CDO hams are glazed with special sauce and are ready to serve like cold cuts, but we fry them just the same.
Comparing CDO and Purefoods Hams
Price wise CDO Holiday Premium Ham is cheaper at 484 pesos per kilo at SM Hypermart whereas a kilo of Purefoods Fiesta Ham retails for 493 pesos at the same grocery. Price difference of nine pesos only. I’ve been checking in the other supermarkets such as Robinson and Gaisano Mactan and the prices for these two ham brands are the same across these different establishments as far as I recall.
Since the price is almost similar and they both are good quality hams, I’ve decided to buy one of each so I can compare how CDO and Purefoods taste and to find out which ham is best for the Noche Buena celebration. I’ll be updating this post for review and taste test comparison later on when we cook the Christmas hams. I’ll have my family as test subjects/judges hehehe. 
Special Packaging of Christmas Hams
Hamon sa Hamon sa Pasko!
Read: first “hamon” is tagalog word for “challenge”, second “hamon” means ham. Same word but spoken differently so different meaning
For the past few weeks, late November and early December, I have been going to the grocery to check out prices for comparison as well as watching for price increases and promo deals and giveaways on the usual food items for the Noche Buena feast including Christmas hams.
Last year I got a free plastic plate for every kilo of CDO ham. We don’t really use the plates but I like that they give out freebies hahaha. Purefoods does not have a promotion last Christmas. Both hams comes in special pang-pasko packaging.
A few hours ago, we (the usual suspects – me + siblings + bf) braved the Christmas crowd at Parkmall Mandaue SM Hypermart for our last minute Christmas grocery shopping. Not surprisingly, CDO and Purefoods kiosks were side by side at the center of the grocery store. These two brands are really out to make the most sales these Christmas season and must be pretty competitive with each other hehe.
Christmas ham is really a big thing and lots of shoppers look for them, hence they are put in central locations complete with dedicated merchandisers. Mom was even afraid if we buy late, they will all be gone come Christmas Day hehe.
To have a taste test and to decide which ham is best, I got one from each brand.
We first approached the kiosk of CDO and got 1 kilo of their Holiday Whole Meat Premium Cut Ham. The merchandiser gave us our ham in a special Christmas box, no freebie included, price was P484 a kilo.
Beside the kiosk of CDO was the kiosk of Purefoods, we ordered Purefoods Fiesta Ham for P493 per kilo. Their ham comes with a separate pack of special ham sauce. PLUS, Purefoods has a freebie beside the eco-friendly reusable bag, the merchandiser also gave us a 230 grams pack of Purefoods Tender Juicy Hotdog, na puedeng pangsahog sa Spaghetti for Noche Buena. Nakatipid ng konti hehe.
Price difference comparing CDO and Purefoods is just 9 pesos, in favor of CDO Whole Meat. But again, the freebie of Purefoods more than make up for the slight price difference.
Christmas Ham TASTE TEST
Now this one will have to be written later, it’s still 1 AM now December 24. I’ll update this post after our Noche Buena feast or morning of Dec 25. ^_^ I am thinking if I am going to conduct a blind taste test hahah wag na baka over na lol.
Enjoy Noche Buena!
Malipayong Pasko! Maligayang Pasko!
Cold Cuts – Ham from Purefoods and CDO
You can eat this cold cuts right away should you wish to.
Purefoods Fiesta Ham
CDO Holiday Whole Meat Premium Cut Ham
UPDATE! The TASTE TEST DECISION! – Before I share the verdict of my family, let me share this short add-on info on both hams for Christmas.
1. Purefoods is leaner than that of CDO; CDO Premium Holiday Ham includes some fats with the lean meat, as their official description says its whole meat (fat+lean portion).
2. CDO’s ball of ham is coated with their special secret sauce whereas with Purefoods, the special sauce is package separately although their ball has slight sauce coating on its own. CDO is sweeter than Purefoods, Fiesta Ham is a little bit more briny than the Holiday Premium.
3. Purefoods is faster to fry than CDO, which my mom attributed to the fact that CDO has “fatty” portion on it as you can see from the picture above.
It was a unanimous decision, we go for CDO Premium Cut Whole Meat Ham. For Noche Buena 2013, we will be just buying CDO then.
My family does that midnight meal too. Us being Ukrainian Orthodox we have kielbasa instead of ham though. I could go for some kielbasa right now actually. haha
h vince, thanks for sharing that =), I’ll be googling ‘kielbasa’ to have an idea of what this food look like hehe