Cranberry Salsa

Fresh Cranberry Salsa, perfect for turkey tacos! Cranberries, apple, scallions, ginger, chili, cilantro, and lime.

Elise Bauer

Elise founded Simply Recipes in 2003 and led the site until 2019. She has an MA in Food Research from Stanford University.

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Elise Bauer
Updated February 16, 2021
Elise Bauer
Cranberry Salsa
Elise Bauer

This is a quick and easy salsa recipe made with fresh cranberries, apples, ginger, scallions, cilantro, and chilies that is especially good with turkey (see our turkey tacos), but can be used with any dish that calls for fresh salsa.

The fresh cranberries are tart, quite tart, so need some sweetness to balance them in this salsa. For that reason we are adding some sugar. The apple too helps bring some sweet balance to the cranberries.

Cranberries are only in season for a short time in the fall. Once they appear in the supermarket, fresh in bags, snatch them up while you can!

They will last frozen for a few months, but even then, after a while they will begin to get a bit iffy, so fall really is the time to enjoy whole cranberries.

Cranberry Salsa
Elise Bauer
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Cranberry Salsa

Prep Time 15 mins
Total Time 15 mins
Yield 1 cup

Most of the ingredients are roughly chopped because they will be going into a food processor. If you don't have a food processor, grate the ginger and finely chop or mince the cranberries, apple, chile, green onions, and cilantro.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cups of fresh or frozen cranberries
  • 1/2 an apple, peeled, cored, roughly chopped
  • 1/2 jalapeño (or serrano) chile, seeds removed, roughly chopped (less or more to taste, depending on how hot the chile is and how hot you would like your salsa to be)
  • 2 green onions (scallions), chopped, including light green parts (about 1/4 cup)
  • 4 Tbsp sugar
  • 2 Tbsp chopped fresh cilantro
  • 1 Tbsp peeled chopped ginger
  • 1 Tbsp lime or lemon juice
  • Dash of salt

Method

  1. Place the cranberries, apple, chile, green onions, sugar, cilantro, ginger, lime juice and salt (all of the ingredients) in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse several times until everything is finely chopped and well blended.

  2. Let the salsa sit for at least 15 minutes for the sugar in the salsa to soften the chopped cranberries.

    Store chilled in an airtight container until ready to serve.

    Serve with chips or as a side to pork, chicken, turkey, or steak. You can also place a dollop over a cracker that has been spread with cream cheese for an appetizer.

Finished Cranberry Salsa Recipe in Bowl
Elise Bauer