Sunday bakes – spiced cranberry and apple chutney

Ok, ok so it isn’t strictly speaking a ‘bake’ but with punnets of cranberries now starting to be discounted it’s a great time to stock up and preserve them.

I tried a variation of these a few years ago with red cabbage. Whilst the red cabbage added to the aesthetic it really, really detracted from the taste, so this time I thought maybe I would try it without. 

Ingredients

2lbs cooking apples – cut into chunks

1 lbs fresh cranberries

1.5lbs chopped onion

3oz minced fresh ginger

16oz light brown sugar

3 crushed and chopped garlic cloves

250ml either cider or red wine vinegar

½ tsp ground cloves

1 tsp nutmeg, fresh grated

1 tsp cinnamon

Method

Put the apples, onions, cranberries and garlic into a saucepan with the vinegar and bring to the boil. Simmer until the fruit has broken down to a chutney consistency then add the spices and the sugar. Stir these in until the sugar completely dissolves then leave to simmer for 2 hours making sure that the chutney does not stick to the bottom.

Collect your jam jars and place them onto a baking tray. Heat in the oven for 10 minutes before pouring the chutney in and cover the mixture with a circle of baking paper.

You will need to store this chutney for at least a month before you use it, but it gets better with age. I prefer to wait two months.