Cleo Coyle's Colonial Cranberries

This post was named a #1 Foodbuzz Top 9 Pick. Thank you Foodbuzz!

~Cleo Coyle

First a happy contest announcement:

Congrats to Molly for suggesting our winning Secret Ingredient for December: Cranberries! Molly won a $25 Williams-Sonoma gift card for her suggestion. Janel G. won our prize for January (a Junior’s Cheesecake) and we’re revealing her Secret Ingredient in a few weeks. Would you like to suggest a new secret ingredient for our February Iron Chef? If we choose yours, you’ll win a great prize. Just send your suggestions to our mail box: MysteryLoversKitchen@gmail.com. One entry per person per day for our followers. The winner will be chosen among our followers only, so join us! Just scroll down our right column and hit the "follow" button! Watch our posts next week to find out what prize you might win for your suggestion!



Cleo Coyle’s Colonial Cranberries

When I found out our secret ingredient this week was cranberries, I had wanted to do a “Mock Cherry” pie for you. This very old American dish, in which a cook substitutes cranberries for cherries, has been around for years. I will be doing a mock cherry pie in the near future, but this week I simply did not have the time. Then I realized who does have the time?! So I changed up the idea and decided to do something unique but extremely simple, something you can create in a flash.

I have enjoyed making this cranberry dish almost every holiday season, whenever those scarlet berries are available fresh in our local grocery. The inspiration for my “Colonial Cranberries” actually came from Jeff Smith, whose research dug up a note in John Adams’ 18th century journals in which he spoke about enjoying a dinner that included wild goose on a spit and cranberries in a cast iron skillet baked in a “slack” oven.

Cleo's Colonial
Cranberries: Baked

My version uses a much handier casserole dish. My sugar choice is light brown for added depth of flavor. Oranges were not so easy to come by in 18th century Massachusetts, but I think adding orange zest brings a lively bright note to this dish. Orange and cranberry is a fairly common combo in recipes , but I especially like it because professionals in the coffee trade have taught me to look for citrus notes in some of the very best coffees of the world (Ethiopian Yirgacheffee and La Esmeralda Especial for instance), and I think it works in this dish, too.

Cleo's Colonial Cranberries
Ingredients

We’ve enjoyed this sweet-tart sauce warm over ice cream, pound cake a la mode (as you see pictured below), on pancakes in place of syrup, on French toast, as a kind of loose jam on raisin bread (one of my favorite ways to eat it), and as a chutney with spicy Indian meat dishes. The flavor may not be for everyone, but if you’re a fan of raspberry flavor and tart berry jams and jellies, this just might be up your foodie alley… We know Mr. Adams certainly enjoyed it!

Cleo's Colonial Cranberries
Serving suggestion: over pound cake a la mode...

Cleo Coyle's Colonial Cranberries

Recipe: Place in a medium casserole dish 2 cups cranberries (sliced in two), 1 cup light brown sugar (lightly packed), ½ teaspoon orange zest (grated rind of an orange, no white pith). Stir together well. Cover. Bake 1 hour in an oven pre-heated to 250° Fahrenheit. After baking, remove from oven, add 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract. You’ll notice some of the sugar will have collected on the bottom. A good stir will fix this and nicely incorporate the final vanilla flavoring. Eat with joy.

Serving ideas: Pour over ice cream, pound cake, French toast, pancakes, apple pie a la mode. Use like a loose jam on a slice of raisin bread, croissants, or slices of toasted French or Italian bread. Serve as a sweet chutney with spicy Indian meat dishes.

Flavoring options: Replace the vanilla with 2 teaspoons almond extract OR 1-2 tablespoons of Amaretto or 1-2 tablespoons of your favorite brandy.

CLEO'S TIPS: On the casserole dish: I spray mine lightly with nonstick cooking spray to prevent the sugar from sticking. On the cranberries: Be sure to slice the cranberries in two. This may take a few minutes, but you need to do this to expose more of the berry to the sugar and the process of carmelization. On the cooking: Don’t try to rush the process. Keep the oven temp low and do the full hour of baking to give the flavors time to develop.


Eat with joy!

~ Cleo Coyle
author of the Coffeehouse Mysteries

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Let's look at that
one more time...

Destroyed!

Text and photos in this post are copyright (c) 2009 by Alice Alfonsi who writes The Coffeehouse Mysteries as Cleo Coyle with her husband, Marc Cerasini

Comments welcome!