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Cranberry Desserts

Cranberry Clafouti
             Clafouti Recipe - Susan Wenger
             Classic Clafouti - Astrid Bear
Cranberry Crumbles
             Cranberry-Cherry Crumble - Doug Essinger-Hileman
             A Question About Doug's Cranberry-Cherry Crumble - Marian Van Til
             The Reply - Doug Essinger-Hileman
Cranberry Pies
             Jeff Smith's Cranberry Pie - Kyle Lerfald
             Cranberry-Peach Pie - Rowen
             Cranberry-Cherry Pie - Bruce Trinque
             Cranberry Pie - Marian Van Til
             Cranberry Pie Addition - Doug Essinger-Hileman

Cranberry Clafouti
Clafouti Recipe - Susan Wenger
1 tablespoon butter (for greasing pan)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 cup flour
1 cup half-and-half or whole milk
Pinch salt
2 cups cranberries
Scant cup walnuts
Confectioners' sugar
1. Heat the oven to 425 degrees. Butter a deep 9- or 10-inch pie plate or a gratin dish of similar size. Sprinkle it with a tablespoon or so of sugar, then swirl dish to coat evenly. Invert to remove excess.
2. Beat eggs well, then add remaining sugar. Beat until smooth. Add flour, and beat again until smooth. Add the half-and-half or milk and salt, and whisk until smooth.
3. Coarsely chop cranberries and walnuts. If using a food processor, do not overprocess - just pulse until chopped. (It's very fast.) Put cranberry mixture in pie plate, and pour batter over it.
4. Bake for about 30 minutes, or until clafoutis is nicely browned on top and a knife inserted into it comes out clean. Sift some confectioners' sugar over it, and serve warm or at room temperature.
Yield: At least 6 servings.

Classic Clafouti - Astrid Bear
Classic clafouti is made with cherries. I've made it with them, and also blackberries, but I wouldn't call it anything like a cobbler. I my mind, a cobbler is more like a juicy fruit pie filling topped with a crumbly sort of a crust. A clafouti is a batter, sort of like a sweet version of Yorkshire pudding (but not as airy, because it isn't poured into hot fat) poured over the scattered fruit, which then mostly rise to the top of the batter as it cooks. The texture is fairly dense, not cake-like at all, and it's really yummy!

Cranberry Crumbles
Cranberry-Cherry Crumble - Doug Essinger-Hileman
Bring 1 cup of port to a boil with 1 4-inch stick of cinnamon and 1 cardamon seed. Remove from the heat and let stand 10 minutes. Remove the spices, bring the spiced port back to a boil, and add 1 pound of cranberries and 1/2 pound of dark cherries. Cook until the cranberries begin to pop. (You can reduce the heat to prevent splattering, if you wish!)
Using a slotted spoon, transfer the fruit to a casserole dish. Add liquid just until you can see the liquid (the level of the liquid should remain below the level of the fruit; you should use only about 1/3 of the available liquid). Top with the crumble mixture (5 ounces of whole wheat flour, 5 ounces of sugar and 1/2 cup butter, mixed until crumbly in texture). Bake for 35 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Serve with whipped cream if desired.

A Question About Doug's Cranberry-Cherry Crumble - Marian Van Til
A question: I'm wondering about your cooking the cranberries first.
I just made a variation of this a few days ago. Inspired by your initial suggestion, I soaked fresh cranberries in port for a couple of days. Then threw them into a larger bowl with some sugar, cinnamon, cloves, orange zest (no cherries), and about 1/4 cup of whole wheat flour to soak up some of the port; added a crumble topping very much like yours, but with dark brown sugar and less butter, and baked for about a half hour. The consistency was perfect and it had a great texture.
And tasted wonderful with whipped cream.

The Reply - Doug Essinger-Hileman
This method of cooking was first inspired by a recipe I saw in Food and Wine magazine for cranberry relish. The advantages it has for this particular recipe are:
1) I wanted a very sublime taste of spice. Infusing the port with the cinnamon and cardamon was just perfect!
2) By precooking the cranberries, the cranberry juice mingles with the port/orange juice. This provides a wonderful juice to pour on top of the crumble at serving time.

Cranberry Pies
Jeff Smith's Cranberry Pie - Kyle Lerfald
This comes from The Frugal Gourmet Cooks American by Jeff Smith.
Wash 4 cups of fresh cranberries. Chop, then mix with 1 1/2 cups of sugar and 3 tablespoons of cornstarch. In separate bowl, mix 1 lightly beaten egg with 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract; combine with cranberry/sugar mixture. Line pie dish with pastry, add cranberry mix, and finish with lattice top. Bake for 10 minutes at 400 degrees fahrenheit, reduce heat to 350 degrees, and bake until done (cranberries are soft and pastry brown), which will take about 35 minutes.

Cranberry-Peach Pie - Rowen
Just make a peach pie and use cranberries for half the fruit. And add ground cardomom - sprinkled over the top of the fruit like cinnamon. Yummy! (Fresh peaches are good, but frozen work just as well - stir in about 1/4 - 1/2 cup sugar if they are a bit tart.)

Cranberry-Cherry Pie - Bruce Trinque
We have made a great pie by combining cranberries with cherries (not the sour variety) with no sugar. The sweetness of the cherries, balancing the tartness of the cranberries. I recollect that we used about a 50/50 ratio.
And, speaking of cranberries, I visited the annual Cranberry Fest in Carver, Mass, (home of the Edaville RR) yesterday. I think they had samples of everything that can possibly be made from cranberries, including cranberry-horseradish jam.

Cranberry Pie - Marian Van Til
2 cups fresh cranberries (uncooked) -- chopped, if preferred
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
2 eggs, well-beaten
1 cup sugar (or slightly less, if you like it more tart)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 pie crust for 10" pie pan
Combine cranberries, brown sugar and walnuts together. Spread the mixture into the bottom of the prepared pie shell. Beat eggs well; gradually add the sugar; continue beating. Stir in flour and melted butter. Pour batter over the berries in the pie shell. Cover edges of pie crust with foil and bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. reduce heat to 350 degrees, remove foil and bake 35 minutes longer. Serve with ice cream.

Cranberry Pie Addition - Doug Essinger-Hileman
If you ask me, a bit of orange zest in this recipe (actually, in any recipe of cranberry pie) would be wonderful. One of my favorite recipes for cranberry sauce at Thanksgiving is a simple mixture of cranberries, oranges and sugar, chopped together. Wonderful stuff!