Cranberry-Orange Relish with Walnuts

This recipe is slightly modified from the one I made for our last Wooden Spoon Thanksgiving two years ago. I cut the original recipe in half, cut the spices in half again (i.e. 1/4 the original), and added walnuts, to meet the requirement that everything at this dinner have nuts. The recipe I actually made is given below; for the original recipe, see here.

Because there was less, I was able to make this easily in a 2 quart saucepan. This amount is probably enough for 4 people at least. Maybe because there was less, the relish started to scorch near the end of the cooking time, but fortunately this didn’t seem to affect the flavor. It also got darker and thicker than I remember, but that’s okay. Even with half the amount of ginger and cinnamon, I felt it was plenty spicy. You might want to cut back still further.

I added walnuts because I had seen other relish recipes that included them. We decided that this was an excellent idea. The walnuts add more texture, and the flavor complements the rest of the relish well. I added them late in the cooking process because I thought they might get soggy if I put them in earlier, but I haven’t actually tested this.

Addendum, 1/10/10: I made this again as below but with only half the amount (i.e. 1/2 tsp each) of ginger and cinnamon. I think this is about the right amount. Also, you might want to reduce the amount of walnuts a little, say to 1/3 cup.

Verdict: Yum! This one's a keeper!

Cranberry-Orange Relish with Walnuts
(source: modified from a recipe in USA Weekend, Nov. 13, 2005)

½ cup brown sugar

½ cup honey

2 cups orange juice

1 tsp ground ginger

grated zest of 1 orange

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 bag fresh cranberries

½ cup chopped walnuts

1 tsp salt

In a medium-sized, heavy saucepan over low heat, combine the sugar, honey, and orange juice. Simmer until completely dissolved. Add ginger, zest, and cinnamon; stir to combine. Add the cranberries and simmer, uncovered and stirring occasionally, until mixture begins to thicken, about two hours. Add the walnuts after about an hour and a half. When thickened, add salt. Chill and serve.

Recycle: honey jar

Compost: ginger peels