Evidently I have lost my mind.
A good friend has given me several dozen beautiful Meyer lemons from her yard. I’m looking at the pile of them right now. Satsuma season is upon us and I know my uncle will become the satsuma bandit at any minute, leaving grocery bags of them on the back steps when nobody is home. And yet, still–STILL!–I allowed myself to be seduced by marked-down limes at the grocery store. I brought home four. Bags, I mean. Not four limes.
I have no reasonable explanation for the limes, and now I’m knee-deep in a citrus emergency largely of my own making. If I can get myself out of it before the plague of fruit flies arrives, it will be a miracle.
(EDIT: Since I started writing this post two days ago, another pal pulled off a kumquat reverse-heist. The only thing we don’t have here? Scurvy.)
Thank heavens I adore any and all citrus. I am going to make Meyer lemon marmalade while I watch football later, but I don’t have enough jars to jellify all this fruit. Luckily, I have another citrus trick or two up my sleeve, and one is the world’s easiest relishes.
A few years back I was hunting through cranberry orange relish recipes ahead of Thanksgiving when a lively discussion on the Internet caught my attention. People were either raving about this one version of cranberry orange relish, or swearing they would never make any other, or begging for the recipe. (There was also much slandering of canned cranberry sauce, but I digress.) Turns out the recipe they were all talking about had been on the back of the Ocean Spray bag of fresh cranberries at some point. I don’t know if Ocean Spray started running some other recipe on the bag or what, but people sure were in a lather about this particular one. And they were right. This is the best cranberry orange relish I’ve ever had. And the funny thing is that the recipe is ridiculously simple:
Cranberry Orange Relish
1 bag fresh cranberries
1 whole unpeeled orange–remove any seeds and cut in eighths
¾ cup of sugar
Put ½ the cranberries, ½ the orange, and ½ the sugar in a food processor (or blender) and buzz until very finely chopped. Pour that into a bowl, repeat with the rest of the ingredients. Combine and refrigerate for several hours to allow flavors to meld.
No, seriously, that’s it. And just like that, this recipe became our house cranberry stuff for Thanksgiving, and I’ve never looked back. As my girls will tell you, the real reason I even ever cook a turkey at Thanksgiving is my very favorite Thanksgiving leftover sandwich: sliced roast turkey on a big, fat, croissant with melted brie, and that cranberry orange relish. (The best thing to drink with this is champagne, BTW.)
So fast forward a couple of years and I am having the satsuma issue I mentioned earlier. After making all manner of things–including satsuma daiquiris–I got wise and tossed the rest of the satsumas into the food processor with some sugar, a big pinch of salt, and a teaspoon of red pepper flakes. EUREKA! Spicy satsuma relish is terrific! It is especially good as a condiment for roasted or grilled chicken. It’s also quite nice with pork. The recipe works with kumquats, too. I love it so much that I’m adding a lime relish to my repertoire this year. So far an orange/lime/ginger version is winning.
A nifty thing about these relishes is that they’re not one hit wonders. They are really quite versatile, and keep so well in the freezer. I freeze what I don’t use within several days in 1 cup batches, and they’re still pretty and they taste great when thawed later. I use them often as is, but I also use them in all sorts of things. I like to mix some relish with an equal amount of soft butter, roll into logs, wrap in wax paper, and freeze for use on vegetables, or even on hot biscuits. This is so easy, just slice the amount you want off the log and put the rest back in the freezer. The satsuma relish butter is awesome on steamed broccoli, I happen to know. And a little of the cranberry orange butter on a hot baked sweet potato will transport you straight to the best part of the holidays anytime. I have even added a cup of cranberry orange relish (well drained) to a plain muffin recipe and been very happy with the results. The lime relish is going to be great mixed with leftover rice for a new and improved leftover. And I bet it will also utterly transform steamed or roasted cauliflower. I can’t wait to try it with a grilled steak. Or swordfish.
Wow. Now I can’t stop thinking about lime-orange-ginger relish butter on grilled swordfish. (EDIT #2: It was really good. We’ll be doing that again!)
Anyway, I once served a heap of the cranberry orange relish over cream cheese I’d molded in a springform pan for a fancy Christmas party, and people went crazy over it. I assembled it on a pretty cake stand and it was gorgeous. At home a thick smear of cream cheese on a plate with some citrus relish spooned over it and a pile of crackers is a light and tasty no-fuss wine o’clock food. I think I’m going to try adding one of these relishes to a cake batter of some sort for the holidays. (Ooooh–cream cheese pound cake??!) I’ll let y’all know how that goes.
Cranberry Orange Relish
Ingredients
- 1 bag fresh cranberries
- 1 whole orange unpeeled, cut in eighths, any seeds removed
- 3/4 cup sugar
Instructions
- Put ½ the cranberries, ½ the orange, and ½ the sugar in a food processor (or blender) and buzz until very finely chopped. Pour that into a bowl, repeat with the rest of the ingredients. Combine and refrigerate for several hours to allow flavors to meld. Will keep in the refrigerator at least a week, and freezes wonderfully.
Spicy Satsuma or Kumquat Relish
Ingredients
- 4 cups satsumas or kumquats, the satsumas cut into eighths--about 6 satsumas--or kumquats cut in half (If using kumquats, pinch the halves to expel the seeds easily. Do this over a bowl to catch any juices.)
- ⅔ cup sugar
- ½ t. salt
- 1 t. red pepper flakes, or to taste
Instructions
- Add all ingredients to the bowl of your food processor. Process until very finely chopped. Refrigerate for several hours to allow flavors to meld.
Lime Orange Ginger Relish
Ingredients
- 3 limes
- 1 orange
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/2 t. salt
- 1 ½ inch piece ginger, roughly chopped
Instructions
- Zest all the limes into the bowl of a food processor. Then cut away the remaining peel and pith for each lime like this: cut the ends off of a lime, set the fruit on one cut end. With a sharp knife, and working from top to bottom, cut the pith away in strips all the way around, exposing the bare ends of the segments. Throw away the peel and pith.
- Toss the now naked limes into the food processor. Cut the orange into eighths, and discard any seeds. Add the sugar and ginger and pulse until the fruit is finely chopped.
- The lime even without the pith will make this a little bitter at first. Let the relish age for 12 to 24 hours in the refrigerator, and the bitterness will calm down significantly. And the ginger will be more pronounced.
Welcome to citrus season on the Gulf Coast!
I also have lots of Meyer lemons, same source! Would love the lemon marmalade recipe. Had a friend today tell me he has more oranges for me so I will be making your relish this week.
Colette, I’ll find it!
Okay, I’m printing all these up! I wish I was lucky enough to have people drop citrus on my doorstep. Have a merry Christmas, Malia.
Merry Christmas, Mary Margaret!
When you use whole fruit as you recipes indicate, is the white part of the peel not really bitter? I love citrus but I am afraid this will be too bitter for me.
This is such a great question! The sugar in these recipes counters the bitterness. You’ll probably notice that the prepared relishes themselves aren’t very sweet. That’s because the amount of sugar called for is there to balance any sourness and bitterness, and ot enhance the citrus flavor. A lot of the bitterness in citrus is in the seeds, which is why the instructions have you discard them. And (to be perfectly nerdy about it) taste is a biologically individual sense. You can always adjust the sugar up a little to suit your particular taste.