Spicy Cranberry Compote

The base for this recipe comes from the first food blog I ever started following, Closet Cooking. Kevin is a brilliant cook and is always concocting something yummy looking in his tiny kitchen in Canada! He is truly an inspiration!
I came upon his recipe for Jalapeño Cranberry Sauce while looking for something to go with my contribution to National Grilled Cheese Month. I’ve been working on the sandwiches for a couple weeks now, using the canned jellied cranberry sauce initially. Sadly, the stuff melted and mostly oozed out of the sandwich before we could even eat them, so I needed to find a different way to incorporate the cranberries into my sandwiches. Yes, I probably could have just left the cranberry element out, but the rest of the flavors are sweet so I wanted something to cut through some of the sweetness…
While I was intrigued by Kevin’s concoction, I didn’t have any jalapeños on hand and didn’t exactly feel inclined to run to the store just for them, so had to come up with something different. I also didn’t want to include any alcohol in mine, since these were sandwiches for a lunch, so I omitted that. There were only a few other small changes that I made, but the end result turned out to be quite delicious!

Printable Recipe

½ c. orange juice
½ c. sugar
1 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes
3 c. cranberries, picked clean
½ tsp. lemon juice

Mix the orange juice, sugar, and red pepper flakes in a medium sauce pan; and the cranberries and stir to combine. Simmer the mixture until the cranberries burst, stirring from time to time, about 10 minutes. Add the lime juice and remove from heat. Serve warm on top of meat. Allow the mixture to cool and store in the refrigerator. Makes approximately 2 cups