Cranberry Cream Cheese Dip

Cranberry cream cheese dip is a whipped layer of cream cheese in a shallow dish with a heap of cranberry on top, scooped up on crackers or toasted baguette, and it is the appetizer that shows up on more Thanksgiving and Christmas tables than any other because it takes 15 minutes and looks like it took an afternoon. There are two versions, and this page gives both on the same base. The fresh cranberry-jalapeño relish is the one that went viral: raw cranberries pulsed with jalapeño, scallion, cilantro, lime and sugar, tart, sweet and hot at once. The cooked brandy-orange sauce is the older, warmer, more Thanksgiving version. Both work on the same whipped base, and both depend on one piece of cranberry chemistry.

The recipe card at the bottom has the amounts and numbered steps for the base and both toppings, enough for eight to ten. This guide covers what makes a cranberry behave the way it does, the whipped base, the raw relish and why it has to rest, the cooked sauce and why it gels, how to control the jalapeño heat, and make-ahead. It sits in the site's recipes collection with the caramelized onion dip and the rest of the holiday and seasonal cooking.

What Cranberries Bring: Pectin, Acid, and Bite

A cranberry is a small, hard, sour berry with more natural pectin than almost any other fruit, and pectin plus acid is the pair that makes a fruit set into a gel. That is the whole reason cranberry sauce thickens on its own where a strawberry sauce needs help. Pectin is a long chain molecule in the cell walls; when the berries are heated they burst and release it, and Scientific American's kitchen-science test of cranberry sauce found that as the berries pop, more pectin goes into the liquid, the chains tangle into a net that traps the dissolved sugar, and the longer the mixture cooks past about 210°F the firmer it sets when it cools. Sugar is not just sweetness: the same test notes that sugar is what lets the pectin molecules find one another.

Raw, the same berry is astringent and firm, which is why a raw relish is chopped fine and rested with sugar rather than eaten straight. Fresh cranberries are a fall crop, harvested from mid-September into late October; the Cape Cod Cranberry Growers' Association traces commercial cultivation to Dennis, Massachusetts in 1816, and the bags in the store are the dry-harvested fruit of that season. They keep well: Ocean Spray says fresh cranberries last up to a month in the refrigerator in their bag and freeze in the package for up to a year, so a bag bought in October makes this dip at Christmas. Sort out any soft berries and stems, rinse, and drain well before either version.

The Whipped Cream Cheese Base

Cream cheese is dense enough to hold a wet topping without going soupy because of how much fat it carries: the federal standard of identity requires at least 33 percent milkfat and no more than 55 percent moisture, which makes it a thick, stable emulsion cold. Beat a softened 8-ounce block with 2 tablespoons of sour cream and a pinch of salt for a minute, until it lightens and swirls; the beating works air into the fat and the sour cream loosens it just enough to spread with an offset spatula into a shallow dish, swirled so the topping pools in the ridges. Do not use the whipped tub kind, which is already aerated with more water and slumps under a heavy topping.

The base is where a flavor can go. A tablespoon of orange zest folded in suits the cooked sauce; a half teaspoon of grated garlic and a little lime zest suit the jalapeño relish. Spread it up to a day ahead, cover, and refrigerate; add the topping within an hour of serving so the juice does not bleed all the way through. The same whipped base carries the site's caramelized onion dip.

Version One: The Fresh Cranberry-Jalapeño Relish

Pulse 12 ounces of rinsed fresh cranberries in a food processor with one or two jalapeños, three scallions, a quarter cup of cilantro, a half cup of sugar, the juice and zest of a lime and a pinch of salt, in short pulses, until the berries are chopped to the size of a pea; keep going and it becomes a smoothie. Then it has to rest: cover and refrigerate at least 4 hours, and overnight is better. The rest is not optional. Raw cranberry is sour and mouth-puckering, and it is the sugar and time that fix it: sugar on cut fruit pulls juice out of the cells by osmosis, the juice dissolves the sugar into a syrup, and the syrup soaks back into the fruit, so the relish that was dry and harsh at hour zero is glossy, juicy and balanced by hour four. Drain off the excess liquid before it goes onto the cream cheese, or the top will weep.

The heat is in your hands, and the common advice about it is wrong. The capsaicin that makes a jalapeño hot is made in glands between the placenta, the pale ribs inside the pepper, and the membrane that holds the seeds; Colorado State University's food-source guide is explicit that the seeds themselves do not produce it, though they pick some up by contact. So scraping out the seeds alone does little; cut out the white ribs for a mild relish, leave them in for a hot one, and use two peppers with ribs for the version that made the dip famous. Jalapeños run from about 2,500 to 10,000 Scoville units depending on variety, and the pepper you bought is anyone's guess, so taste a sliver first. Wear gloves, and if your hands burn, milk works where water does not; capsaicin dissolves in fat, not water.

Version Two: The Cooked Brandy-Orange Cranberry Sauce

Put 12 ounces of cranberries in a small saucepan with a half cup of sugar, a half cup of fresh orange juice, the zest of the orange in strips and a pinch of salt, and bring it to a simmer over medium heat. In 3 or 4 minutes the berries start to pop, and by about 10 minutes most have burst and the liquid has thickened; stir in 2 tablespoons of brandy and cook 1 minute more. Stop while a few berries are still whole. The sauce looks loose in the pan and sets as it cools, because the pectin net forms as the temperature drops; cook it to a jam in the pan and it will be a brick on the dip. Cool it completely, at least an hour, or refrigerate; it thickens further cold.

The brandy is flavor, not fire. A minute of simmering after it goes in cooks off very little of the alcohol; even an hour of simmering leaves a quarter of it, so a sauce for children or anyone avoiding alcohol should use orange juice in its place rather than counting on the heat. Spoon the cooled sauce over the base and finish with orange zest and, if you like, toasted chopped pecans for crunch. It is the same sauce that goes beside the site's Thanksgiving turkey, and the Boursin stuffed mushrooms make a hot partner for this cold dip.

Serving, Make-Ahead and Storage

Serve cold with buttery round crackers, which stand up to a heavy topping, toasted baguette slices, or pita chips; for a gluten-free table, cucumber rounds and endive leaves. Plan on about a quarter cup of dip per person as one of several appetizers. Both toppings keep on their own: the raw relish for a week in the refrigerator, because its acid and sugar preserve it, and the cooked sauce for two weeks. The whipped base keeps 5 days covered. Assemble within an hour of serving and refrigerate any leftovers, topped, for up to 3 days; the top layer will bleed pink into the cream cheese, which changes the look and nothing else. Do not freeze the assembled dip; the cream cheese turns grainy when it thaws.

Variations that hold up: a half cup of chopped toasted pecans pressed into the base under either topping; crumbled goat cheese beaten into the cream cheese for a sharper base; canned whole-berry cranberry sauce, warmed with orange zest and cooled, as a shortcut for the cooked version. A pomegranate-arils-and-jalapeño topping is the December variation, and the same base with the relish makes the filling for cranberry-jalapeño pinwheels in a tortilla.

Cranberry Cream Cheese Dip (Jalapeño Relish or Brandy-Orange Sauce)

A whipped cream cheese and sour cream base spread in a shallow dish and topped either with a fresh cranberry-jalapeño relish pulsed with scallion, cilantro, lime and sugar and rested 4 hours, or with a cooked cranberry sauce simmered with orange and brandy and cooled until it sets. Serves 8 to 10 with crackers.

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 10 minutes mins

Course Appetizer

Servings 10 servings

Calories 180 kcal

Ingredients

  

• For the whipped base
• 8 oz full-fat block cream cheese, softened
• 2 Tbsp sour cream
• 1 pinch fine sea salt
• Version one: fresh cranberry-jalapeño relish
• 12 oz fresh cranberries, rinsed and sorted
• 1–2 jalapeños, stemmed, ribs and seeds removed to taste
• 3 scallions, roughly chopped
• ¼ cup cilantro leaves
• ½ cup sugar
• 1 lime, zest and juice
• ¼ tsp fine sea salt
• Version two: cooked brandy-orange sauce
• 12 oz fresh cranberries, rinsed and sorted
• ½ cup sugar
• ½ cup fresh orange juice, plus the zest in strips
• 2 Tbsp brandy (or more orange juice)
• 1 pinch fine sea salt
• To serve
• Buttery round crackers, toasted baguette slices, or pita chips

Instructions

 

• Make the base: beat the cream cheese, sour cream and salt with a hand mixer or a sturdy spoon for about 1 minute, until lightened and smooth. Spread in a shallow serving dish in swirls with an offset spatula. Cover and refrigerate until serving, up to a day.
• Version one, the relish: pulse the cranberries, jalapeño, scallions, cilantro, sugar, lime zest and juice and salt in a food processor in short bursts until the berries are chopped to pea size. Transfer to a bowl, cover and refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight. Drain off the excess liquid before using.
• Version two, the sauce: combine the cranberries, sugar, orange juice, zest strips and salt in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until most of the berries have burst and the liquid has thickened, about 10 minutes. Stir in the brandy and cook 1 minute more. Remove the zest strips and cool completely, at least 1 hour; it sets as it cools.
• Within an hour of serving, spoon your chosen topping over the base, leaving a border of white showing. Finish the relish with extra scallion and cilantro, or the sauce with orange zest and toasted pecans. Serve cold with crackers or baguette.

Notes

Do not skip the 4-hour rest on the relish; sugar and time are what tame raw cranberry. The heat of a jalapeño is in the white ribs, not the seeds; remove them for mild. Stop the cooked sauce while a few berries are whole; it firms as it cools. Components keep separately (relish a week, sauce 2 weeks, base 5 days); assemble within an hour of serving.

More for the party table: caramelized onion dip, Boursin stuffed mushrooms, and Ramsay-style dinner party appetizers. The main event: Gordon Ramsay's turkey.

Cranberry Cream Cheese Dip FAQs

The questions that come up most: whether it can be made ahead, whether canned cranberry sauce works, how to make it less spicy, why the relish has to rest, what to serve it with, whether it can be frozen, how long it keeps, and how to make the baked version.