Can I Use Dried Cranberries In The Christmas Chutney?

Our answer

Nigella's Christmas Chutney (from NIGELLA CHRISTMAS) is a chutney made with apples and fresh (or frozen) cranberries, plus dates and clementines. It is seasonal in both flavour and colour. As it needs about two months to mature, it is ideal to make when cranberries come into season (usually from mid September).

Unfortunately, dried cranberries are not a good substitute as they will give a different texture to the chutney and as they are dried they also have a significantly lower water content. In the book Nigella does give an alternative for Cranberry and Apple Chutney, but unfortunately the recipe is not available online. You could substitute the cranberries in the recipe with extra apples to make an apple and date chutney or alternatively if you can wait a week or two, then you should start to see cranberries appearing in supermarkets and greengrocers.