mlev on Cortex

Super simple cranberry chutney

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 20 minutes

Toss that canned cranberry jelly in the TRASH. You'll never touch the stuff again after this. This recipe is SUPER adaptable, and you can change up most of these amounts to suit your own tastes.

Additionally, items with a * next to them are optional, especially if you're looking to keep costs down. For example, if you don't have white and brown sugar on hand, you can simply use one or the other for all of it.

I am presenting this recipe as I made it and love it, but I cannot stress enough, make it your own, and feel free to change up the amounts.

240g (1 cup) water
340g cranberries (This was one bag when I shopped. It will be around 4 cups loosely full)
* 80g craisens or raisens or pomegranate craisens or blueberry craisens or whatever (I used Craisens, and 80g is about "a fistful" for me)
* 110g brown sugar (1/2 cup)
* 110g white sugar (1/2 cup)
- If your pantry is bare and you're looking to keep costs down, feel free to just use 220g (1 cup) brown sugar, or 220g (1 cup) white sugar, whatever you have on hand, in place of the white and brown mix. If you have neither, and only want to buy one, I recommend going with brown. Yum.
100g Granny smith apple, peeled and diced (~1/2 apple)
The zest from one orange
The juice from one orange
* 1 tbsp fresh ginger, finely diced (This one is really 100% up to you. Fresh ginger has a pretty strong flavor. Add as much or as little as you want).
* ~1/4 cup chopped nuts. I used hickory nuts.
Spices to your taste
- I used:
  - 2 tsp cinn
  - 1/4 tsp ground clove
- Others you could try:
  - Ground Allspice
  - Pumpkin spice
  - Nutmeg
  - Whatever

I prefer sweeter dishes, but it's also possible to make this chutney as a more savory dish. If you wanted to do that, you could add some celery, onion, scallions, and maybe a bit of onion powder as a spice, and then remove stuff like the orange juice and orange zest.

Gather your ingredients. Dice up the nuts if you're adding nuts, peel and cut the apple, get your measuring cups ready.
Decide what spices you want to use. Again, I used 2 tsp cinnemon and 1/4 tsp ground clove, and it's DELICIOUS. It has a bit of a sweet holiday taste, but is still very suitable for Thanksgiving.
Throw everything except the diced apple into a pot over medium heat and bring it to a slow boil. Saving the apple to the side for now helps it keep just a bit of the crunch for texture. If you accidentally throw the apple in too (like I did), that's not a huge deal. Scoop some out if you want. Or don't. Whatever. Honestly, this recipe is so forgiving.
Boil the mix for around 5 minutes or so, or until the berries start to soften, and pop open and split. Use this time to start cleaning your work area, washing your measuring cups, or loading your dishwasher. Future-self will thank you for it.
After 5 minutes or so, when the berries are splitting and soft, give the whole thing a good mix, and start to smoosh the berries a bit. It is at this point that anyone in your general area will start to wander over and tell you how good it smells and start peeking into the pot.
Once the berries are sufficiently "mooshed", toss in the apple and give it another stir.
Continue to boil the mixture to thicken it up for another 10 minutes or so, stirring occasionally so that the bottom doesn't burn. This is a good time to make a cup of tea to sip occasionally as you ponder your creation.
Once the mixture has thickened up a bit, remove it from the heat and let it cool at room temperature for a bit, before placing it in a separate container to refridgerate until ready to eat.

You can absolutely eat this chutney right out of the pot--and we did!--but you may find that much like homemade coleslaw, it is even better on day 2, after it has had a chance to firm up in the refridgerator, and the spices and flavors have all had a chance to mingle sufficiently.

This dish works great as a side for Thanksgiving. It also is delicious on some toast as a breakfast, and klev and I even threw it on some meatballs IKEA style for dinner last night. YUM.