Ahhhh Thanksgiving. I’m swamped with memories of family gatherings centered around delicious, savory food. Due to COVID 19 this year, our chance at a family gathering isn’t a realistic possibility. The foods I can make, however, can bring out the memories of my childhood and create new ones for my kids to keep the traditions alive. Cooking with my kids has been such a fun way to intergrate math, taste testing and exploration and create meaningful memories together.
There are a few dishes I remember from that were Thanksgiving staples and can be directly connected from my garden to table. We have a cherry tree in our yard and on a good year we can harvest and freeze cherries to use during the year. One of my favorite side dishes is mother/grandmothers Holiday Cranberry-Orange Relish. In the past few years I’ve added a few twists to include our garden resources as well as consumable essential oils that we love to use. My kids LOVE helping make this relish as well as devouring it when the time comes! Kids love to blend and mix so grab your little and “relish” in the memory of cooking together!
Ingredients:
- One package of fresh cranberries
- One large orange (or two small)
- 2 cups frozen cherries
- 1/2 cup Agave/honey or sugar/sugar substitute
- Consumable Essenial Oils: Vanilla, Orange
Directions:
- Cut your orange into 4 or 8 slices, peels and all and place in food processor/blender, rough chop until peels are about the size of pickle relish. Then place in a bowl.
- Rinse and dry cranberries and place in food processor and rough chop also to the same consistency as the orange. Add this to your bowl with the chopped orange.
- Add 2 cups frozen (pitted) cherries to your blender and also rough chop. Add to the bowl.
- Measure your choice of sweetener and place in bowl.
- Add 1-2 drops orange, 1 drop vanilla essential oil
- Mix, mix, mix and taste test of course!
This tastes best after sitting in the fridge over night. It is delicious as a side dish or if you are into making thanksgiving turkey, stuffing, biscuit sandwiches it is delicious added to that also! Enjoy and have a safe and happy Thanksgiving with your family.
