Dorothy’s Fresh Cranberry-Ginger Relish

Dorothy’s Fresh Cranberry-Ginger Relish is a bright, zippy, raw, fresh relish that will add a hot-sweet spark of life to your Thanksgiving or holiday turkey dinner plate, and to all the leftovers for days afterward.

I am the candied ginger queen!  Whether it is ginger scones, gingered lemonade or gingered tuna salad (try it!), I think many things are improved by the well-considered addition of some sweet-hot candied ginger. It’s even good just by itself, as sort of a candy to suck on.

Stir some into fresh cranberries and you’ll have a bright, fresh relish that will add a hot spark of life to your holiday turkey dinner plate. 

This relish made a big splash at my Thanksgiving table a few years back, and I ended up not only eating it with the bird on the big day but with roasted chicken and pork later. I also put it on sandwiches (it can really liven up boring lunch meat) and even dolloped it on a bowl of cottage cheese when I was trying to be virtuous days later.

It’s just wildly good as it sits around in the refrigerator and gets more and more complex.

I’m proud to say my recipe has a bit of a pedigree (warning…shameless boasting ahead!). It was a finalist – one of the top 15 recipes out of 7,000 entered – in the Sunset Magazine Thanksgiving in the West 2005 Recipe Contest. Not too shabby for my five simple ingredients!

I brought this relish and my heady Garlic and Herb Potato Gratin dish to an early Thanksgiving feast with fellow L.A. food bloggers, and we all gobbled it down with our bird. You can see the whole array of delicious recipes at the bottom of this page.

Try my relish at your feast this year, and let me know how you like it.

If you like this recipe and want to save it, pin the image below to your Pinterest board. 

What else can you eat Fresh Cranberry-Ginger Relish with?

1. Roasted chicken or pork
2. Slather it on sandwiches to liven up boring lunch meat
3. With Greek yogurt or cottage cheese for breakfast
4. On vanilla ice cream for dessert!

See anything else on our Thanksgiving table you might like?

Here are the recipes for our whole feast, prepared by some of Los Angeles’ finest food bloggers. All of their recipes and sites are worth a visit. Tell ’em I said hi!

APPETIZER — Crispy Yukon Gold Latkes with Harvest Fruit Puree — Tori Avey — The Shiksa in the Kitchen (Check me out in the maroon shirt in her photo, waiting my turn to take a photo of the table.)
TURKEY – The Perfect Turkey and Sugared Fruit — Denise Vivaldo – Food Fanatics Unwashed
SALAD – Crab, Avocado, Pomegranate Salad in Crisp Endive Leaves, topped with Creamy Tangy Pomegranate Dressing and Lemon Zest — Rachael Hutchings – La Fuji Mama
POTATO – Garlic and Herb Potato Gratin – Dorothy Reinhold – Shockingly Delicious
CRANBERRY – Dorothy’s Fresh Cranberry-Ginger Relish – Dorothy Reinhold – Shockingly Delicious
SIDE — Caramelized Chestnuts and Brussels Sprouts in a Buttery Cider Vinegar Glaze — Greg Henry – Sippity Sup
SIDE — Spiced Roasted Root Vegetables with Carrots, Yams, Parsnips and Chippollini Onions — Cheryl D Lee – Black Girl Chefs Whites
BREAD – Caramelized Shallot and Herb Focaccia — Louise Mellor – Geez Louise
DESSERT — Kahlúa Sweet Potato Pie with Kahlua Whipped Cream — Patti Londre – Worth The Whisk (Check me out in her photo, taking a picture of the table!)

Credit for Thanksgiving table photo on this page: Greg Henry from SippitySup.com

This article was originally published on Shockingly Delicious Nov. 16, 2011 and has been refreshed and republished Nov. 14, 2018.

Tagged as: candied ginger, cranberries, cranberry sauce, ginger, lemon zest, sugar, Thanksgiving