Vintage Recipe Roulette: Mama Stamberg's Cranberry Relish

No spoilers, but it's either inherently unpalatable or worth getting married for...

Yes, it’s supposed to look like that.

Every year since 1971, the venerable first lady of public radio, Susan Stamberg, has talked about her mother-in-law’s cranberry relish. I love hearing about it, because it sounds like one of the most horrible things ever to arise from the human imagination. Y’all know that’s my jam. So of course, I’ve wanted to make this recipe for years. Buckle up.

Although it’s called “Mama Stamberg’s” relish, at some point it was attributed to a real titan in food writing, Craig Claiborne, former Food editor for New York Times. Apparently, it appeared in the paper in 1959, where Mama Stamberg picked it up. Since Claiborne hailed from nearer my part of the country, Mississippi, you might assume it would have Jell-O in it, but it’s a lot stranger than that.

Two of the main ingredients are very familiar — fresh cranberries and sugar — but the rest is onion, sour cream and horseradish. I’ve actually got a shallot here since I have some left from a review of Matthew McConaughey’s viral wasabi and corn tuna salad for TODAY.com (I’ll update with a link when it’s out, because trust me, you don’t want to miss that one).

You can see the recipe here, but this relish is quite simple to make — you grind 2 cups of fresh cranberries with a small onion, and then mix in 3/4 c sour cream, 1/2 c sugar, and 2 T horseradish. I’ve use a manual string-powered chopper so that I don’t get a puree, but you can use a food processor if you’re careful not to pulse too much. It will also help if you cut the onion into pieces smaller than the cranberries.

After mixing, you freeze it, and then thaw starting Thanksgiving morning. You’ll be left with a creamy, Barbie pink substance for turkey and roast beef sandwich purposes.

I like all of these flavors, but the color and the miles of difference between this and my usual cranberry sauce make this literally hard to swallow. Plus, although Susan Stamberg loves it and I have known her voice and trusted her opinion for 40 years, it’s famously divisive. A lot of people don’t like it.

Still, I’ve got it all made, and I think there’s a possibility this will be a real game-changer for some of you who don’t like the usual sticky sweet jammed or jellied cranberry sauce. (That’s understandable, even Ocean Spray is hilariously on record as saying their main ingredient is inherently “astringent and unpalatable”.) I’ve served it up for myself with some sourdough Finn Crisps that I absolutely adore, thinly sliced Granny Smith apple, leftover roasted chicken, and a little sprinkle of nigella seeds.

But first, I am going to taste it plain to check for balance in the flavors, straight out of the bowl. Let’s just say I do not find it balanced. I don’t get much cranberry — I feel like the horseradish is throwing its weight around. But, a relish should always be much stronger when tasted alone than you want the final effect to be, because it will be diluted by whatever you’re eating it with. I’m withholding judgement until I try it in context.

And friends, I think I get it. I demolished all three of these crackers, and I made a little bite of a sort of chicken salad with the last bite — more relish than is pictured here. It’s nothing at all, nothing whatsoever, could not be farther from regular cranberry sauce, but it’s delicious. It is very onion-y, so if you don’t like that, you could soak the raw onion in cold water for a bit, or even microwave it very gently, just 30 seconds or so, and of course shallot is usually milder than onion. The cranberry does come through in context, but there’s none of the bitterness of the usual stuff; the tannins just kind of disappear in the mix. I made it with reduced fat sour cream because of some dietary needs in the family, but it would be better with full fat sour cream. You could make it with full fat Greek yogurt, too, but it won’t freeze as well because of the acids in there — in that case, maybe just chill overnight before serving.

It would be easy to make just a little bite of this if you want to try the idea but don’t want to make a whole ton — just blend a little bit of any sweetened cranberry sauce you already have with a spoonful of sour cream, a little finely minced onion, and a touch of horseradish. I think your Friday Thanksgiving leftovers sandwich will thank you.

RD note: No deals or samples from any brands pictured or mentioned here — these are just things I actually eat on a regular basis and already had in the house.

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