Cranberry Traditions
In the run up to Christmas, as I find myself pottering around in the kitchen more & more making preparations for the big day, experimenting & attempting to stuff enough food for a month in my freezer (hello gluttony!), I fill jars upon jars with preserves.
Mincemeat for the pies, jams & chutneys for gifting, & of course Christmas dinner wouldn’t be without a jar of cranberry sauce to accompany the turkey. I’ll admit, on years where I may have fallen behind on the preserving, it can seem like quite a chore between work, trees & wrapping. It’s for this reason that I thoroughly enjoy making the cranberry sauce, it’s simple, fuss free, requires but 10 minutes of my time & the odd stir. I now make the same recipe year upon year as I find this cranberry sauce is perfect. Purposely, I make far too much of this ruby preserve than I ought, but there is a reason for this…
Years ago, when attempting to make my sauce on Christmas Eve, I found that the recipe I had followed made far too much for my little turkey (even after a couple of sandwiches). Not content with wasting anything, I set about trying to conjure up a recipe to use up my efforts. I had my sauce, a second quantity of shortcrust pastry in the fridge intended for mince pies & enough chocolate in the house to trigger diabetes.
One flavour combination that I love is cranberry & white chocolate, I’ve already used this combination in both muffins & fudge, so why not a pie I thought? Sweeten the sauce a little, add in some white chocolate & see what happens.
What did happen was a fantastic pie of sweet & tart festive flavours. My cranberry & white chocolate pie has now become a Christmas tradition in my house that I fully intend to continue for years to come.
CRANBERRY & WHITE CHOCOLATE PIE
(makes one 22cm pie)
Ingredients:
For the pastry:
- 350g plain flour
- 4 tbsp icing sugar
- zest x1 orange
- 175g butter
- 3-4 tbsp cold water
For the filling:
- 300g cranberry sauce
- 150g caster sugar
- 200g white chocolate, roughly chopped
Method:
- To make the pastry sift together the flour & icing sugar, add in the orange zest, cubed butter & rub together using your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs
- Add the cold water 1 tbsp at a time, using only enough so that the dough comes together
- Shape the dough into a flattened disc, wrap in cling film & leave in the fridge to chill for at least an hour
- Once the pastry has chilled, take half of it & roll out to approximately 3mm thick and use it to line the pie dish, trimming off any overhanging edges
- Use a fork to pierce holes in the bottom of the pastry
- Line the pastry case with baking parchment & fill with baking beans
- Blind bake the pastry case for 10 minutes at 180C
- Remove the baking beans & parchment & return the case to the oven for a further 5 minutes, until it just starts to turn golden
- Remove the case from the oven & leave to cool for 5 minutes,
- To make the filling, simply combine all of the ingredients together in a large bowl
- Evenly spread the cranberry filling into the pie case
- Roll out the remaining half of pastry & cut into strips (or whatever you like to decorate)
- Lay the strips on top of the pie both horizontally & vertically, weaving them as you go to create a lattice effect
- Bake the pie at 180°C for 20 minutes in the oven
- After 20 minutes check to see if the edge is browning & gently wrap the edge of the pie in foil if it is & return to the oven for a further 5 – 10 minutes
- Remove from the oven & allow to coo slightly before serving
Goes great with ice cream
[…] Better late than never, it may seem odd to bring you a recipe for cranberry sauce post Christmas day, however there is a method to my madness as this relates to my next post: Cranberry & White Chocolate Pie. […]
This looks lovely! I actually have half a bag of leftover cranberries in the fridge that I am trying to work out what to do with.
Thank you 🙂 If you do give it go, I’d love to hear how it turned out!
Sounds delicious!!
I love cranberry sauce and I love white chocolate, so next Christmas I’ll definitely be trying to make this happen!