Whole Cranberry Relish Food

CRANBERRY RELISH I

Steps:

• Finely chop the orange in a food processor.
• Combine cranberries and sugar in a heavy saucepan. Cook and stir over medium heat until cranberries just begin to pop, about 10 minutes.
• Transfer cranberries to a bowl, add apricot preserves and mix until melted. Stir in chopped orange, drained crushed pineapple and lemon juice. Cover and refrigerate until well chilled.

WHOLE-BERRY CRANBERRY SAUCE

Steps:

• Combine all ingredients in a medium saucepan.
• Bring to a boil, cover, then turn to medium heat.
• Continue cooking until all the berries pop.
• Remove from heat and let cool.
• Refrigerate until cold, or serve warm.

CRANBERRY RELISH

Steps:

• Wash and scrub the apple and orange.
• Rinse the cranberries in a colander.
• Cut the ends off of the orange just a little, until the sections show through.
• Core the apple and cut into quarters.
• In a food processor on chop with chop blade, chop the frozen cranberries until a relish consistency.
• Scoop out into a bowl.
• Chop apple the same way and add to bowl.
• Cut orange into quarters and add to processor-chop until all rind is in very small relish like particles.
• Add to bowl.
• Mix lightly and sprinkle about 1/2 or 2/3's of the one cup of sugar over mixture and let sit for about 1/2 hour.
• After sitting, mix again and taste.
• If mixture is too tart for you add more sugar until right for you.
• We like it tart.
• Add nuts last.
• Note:We quadruple this recipe or more each year.
• For each additional batch, keep out some of the sugar until the batch has rested.
• The fruit does tend to sweeten some naturally and this shouldn't be real sweet.
• Also-this freezes well.
• After the holidays I make several more batches for the rest of the year and freeze in individual containers-ziplock type bowls- (one per meal 4 serving size).
• Keeps forever and is handy to get out for picnics in the summer also.
• ****For freezing batches I do this without the nuts-they tend to mush out over long periods of time-and though they freeze well as nuts they don't adapt to freezing in liquid foods.
• **2010 update re: option for nuts. Place crushed nuts in a small side bowl and let those who like the nuts sprinkle what they want to mix in with their serving. This also works well, because if there are leftovers, you can freeze it without worrying about the nuts getting mushy. Other option--make two batches, one with and one without With large family gatherings and different tastes or food some can't eat, requirements, this solves the problem. Enjoy.