This is a healthier remake of an old family favorite recipe for Cranberry Chutney. This slightly tart chutney is delightful with a combination of dried fruit, apples, warm spices and the addition of pineapple for sweetness. It comes together easily with fresh or frozen cranberries. The cranberries contain a natural pectin that thickens the chutney as it cools.
How many ways can you serve Cranberry Chutney? I love it layered with Fall Pudding for a scrumptious holiday parfait.
Move over pumpkin pie – this parfait is now my favorite fall dessert.
Cranberry Chutney is a must have with this Lentil Loaf with Date Glaze, Garlic Mashed Potatoes and Roasted Brussels Sprouts & Butternut Squash with a Pomegranate Glaze. Watch our YouTube Video all about this meal!
Chutney is perfect for breakfast on top of a steaming hot bowl of oats or spread over a warm Quinoa Banana Oat Muffin or a Pumpkin Spice Oat Muffin. Layer it between non dairy yogurt and granola for a fun breakfast or snack.
Fill a hot sweet potato (any type will do) with chutney for breakfast or dessert. Oh yes – this is incredibly delicious!
We made a video to show you just how easy this is to make.
Once you make your own chutney you will never buy it again. I like to use the Vidalia Chop Wizard to easily and quickly cut the apples into even sized pieces.
It makes for a lovely home made gift for family, friends and neighbors.
Substitutions
I have not tried any of these substitutions and suggest if you do make substitutions, just play around with the amounts and adjust them to suit your personal preferences.
- A fresh pear or a segmented orange instead of an apple
- Mango- fresh or frozen instead of pineapple
- Canned, fresh or frozen pineapple
- Orange juice instead of apple juice
- Date syrup or pitted dates instead of date paste
- Any dried fruit instead of raisins
Cranberry Chutney
Equipment
- Sauce Pan, Knife, Cutting Board, Spoon
Ingredients
- 2 cups fresh or frozen cranberries
- 1 sweet apple, cored, peeled and diced
- 1 cup pineapple tidbits, fresh, canned or frozen
- ½ cup apple juice unsweetened
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- ½ cup raisins
- ¼ cup date paste (see my recipe for date paste below)
- ¼ teaspoon ground ginger powder
- ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
- ¼ teaspoon ground mustard seeds
- ¼ – 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes – optional
Instructions
- Place all ingredients in a medium size saucepan over med high heat on the stove stop. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently, then reduce heat to a simmer and simmer for 30 minutes.
- While simmering stir the mixture frequently and with the back of a spoon mash the cranberries that don’t pop on their own. This helps release the pectin naturally found in the cranberries which helps the mixture thicken as it cools.
- Once all of the cranberries and apples are soft and cooked through, remove from heat. When cool enough to handle transfer to a glass container, cover and refrigerate.
Notes
- Pear or a segmented orange instead of an apple
- Mango- fresh or frozen instead of pineapple
- Canned, fresh or frozen pineapple
- Orange juice instead of apple juice
- Date syrup or pitted dates instead of date paste
- Any dried fruit instead of raisins
Click on this link if you want to see the blog post and video for Date Paste. For convivence sake I have posted the date paste recipe below.
Date Paste
Equipment
- Food Processor or High Powered Blender
Ingredients
- 1 pound dates, pitted
- boiling water
Instructions
- Pit the dates and place them in a bowl, cover with boiling water and let soak for at least 30 minutes to an hour to soften dates. How long to soak will depend on how moist the dates are. The dryer they are the more soaking time they will need.
- Drain dates reserving soaking water.
- Place soaked dates in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with the S blade, or in high speed blender, add 1 cup of the reserved soaking water and process until smooth., stopping to scrape down the sides when needed. Add more water if it needs to be thinner.
Notes
Be sure to check out our Amazon Affiliate Page where we share many of our favorite small kitchen appliances, kitchen tools, food products, books and fun things for the grandchildren! Thank you for your support!
We are pleased to announce that if you live in Canada we now have an Amazon.CA Shop Page. We have matched up as many items as we can from our US shop page. Occasionally there are differences in brands and or packaging size.
The full address is Amazon.ca/shop/nutmegnotebook
We are also Holland Bowl Mill Affiliates. The 15 inch Holland Bowl Mill Cherry fruit bowl has a permanent home on our kitchen island. It’s beautiful and useful. The heart shaped bowl makes me happy – I love everything heart shaped! We use our 15 inch Beechwood & cherry bowl (his and her’s) to chop our salads everyday. Eating a salad for one meal every day helped me lose weight and become a size 4. I still eat a salad for one meal a day but now it’s a Big Beautiful Chopped salad and it helps me stay a size 4! See the Chopped Salad Blog Post to find out how you can incorporate a chopped salad into your daily food plan and how you can get a free mezzaluna knife with your Holland Bowl order when you use our Holland Bowl affiliate link as well as free engraving and free shipping.
Well – this is the recipe I’m making this year. It sounds delicious! I like my cranberry sauce with a bit of spice. I love the idea of adding raisins too. Thanks for putting out this recipe just in time, Tami!
Hi Colleen,
I hope you tried this recipe and liked it!
Happy Holidays,
Tami
Not sure if this will even make it on the Thanksgiving table It’s that good!!! I didn’t have any apple juice so used orange and turned out great! This will be my first Thanksgiving wfpb and was thinking how I will miss my MIL’s cranberry jello salad (just a little) but this will definitely be the new cranberry staple for the holidays Thanks so much for the recipe Tami, & Happy Thanksgiving toy you and Tom!
Hi Melanie,
I am so delighted to know that this recipe was a good replacement for your old favorite! I hope your first Thanksgiving as a plant based eater was successful.
Congratulations on adopting a plant based lifestyle.
Happy Holidays,
Tami
I just made this, it’s not totally cool yet but it tastes great warm. 🙂 Im so happy to have a tasty cranberry recipe for Thanksgiving tomorrow. Thank you!
Hi Heidi,
I am so glad you like it. I made another batch of it a couple days ago. I love it!
Happy Cooking,
Tami
Have you tried to make this in the Instant Pot, Tamie?
Hi Pat,
No I have not.
It was delicious, I was the one that always loved the cranberry relish that you buy in the can.So since I am living a plant based lifestyle I did not think there would be any way I could substitute the relish. This Chutney is so much better I will be having it year round as long as I can find cranberries. Thanks Tami for another wonderful recipe!!!
I am so glad that you like it so much!
I buy a few bags during the holidays and freeze. I absolutely love this recipe!
I was thrilled to see cranberries in the store because I knew I would be able to make this delish chutney again. I learned my lesson last year after finding out there were no cranberries in the stores after the season ended. This year I am making sure to freeze some of these beauties so I can make this recipe throughout the year.
Oh yes, it’s time to stock up on cranberries! I’m so glad you like this recipe – I do too!
Happy healthy cooking.
I finished the last batch. This time I’m making a double batch to freeze.
A double batch is a good idea!
That’s awesome!
How long will this keep in the refrigerator? I’m making this for Thanksgiving this year and I plan on making it 5 days before the holiday.
We love this chutney!!! We have seriously made it 4 times in the last month. We need to stock up on cranberries so we can make it all year. Makes a wonderful fruit spread and love it on roasted sweet potatoes.
Hi Carolyn,
I am so glad you like the chutney recipe. I love it too! It’s great on sweet potatoes.
Happy Holidays,
Tami
Tami, havE you ever tried freezing?
I love this chutney! I’m making it for Thanksgiving again this year! Thanks for such a great recipe. 💚
Hi Randi – I am so glad you like this recipe. We love it. I really should make it more often during the winter months as it’s delicious on so many things!