Cranberry out of the pantry!

When Nupur announced her BB4 event to help clean the pantry, the first thing that came to mind was the bag of craisins - dried cranberries- that has been hibernating in my pantry for a really long time ! After the baby, we have turned into  big fans of Costco aka anything-we-sell-is-cheap-but-you-buy-sacks-of-it store, I tend to grab bags of dried fruits and nuts whenever I visit there. Just because they are cheap and make a nice healthy snack. But I pretty soon got bored of munching on cranberries and tossed it into a deep dark corner. So to clean my pantry, here are three goodies using cranberries. I don't have a picture of the last one since I munched on it as I made it and the leftovers where not pretty. Two of the three recipes were inspired from the hostess Nupur, they can be found here and here. The first site I look for anything as I find her recipes simple and delicious.

1. Cranberry quick bread

• I set my oven to preheat at 350 degrees. I then soaked 2 cups of dried cranberries in some warm apple juice for 30 minutes. I did not add any sugar as the cranberries were already sweetened.

• I then mixed together 2 cups all purpose flour, 1/2 cup sugar, 1⁄2 tsp. baking soda, 1⁄2 tsp. cinnamon powder and 1⁄2 tsp. salt.

• Then whisked together the wet ingredients: 2 large eggs, 1/4 cup butter and 1 tsp. vanilla extract. I folded the wet and dry ingredients gently. Added the soaked now plump cranberries along with the juice. Baked it for 45 mins

Voila! The cranberry bread is ready! The bread turned out very moist and tasty!

2. Cranberry Pecan Granola

I have been making this very regularly since I made it for the first time. I make a big batch that lasts for two weeks. Hubby loves it and so do I. A great start to the day!

I follow Nupur's recipe to the tee except that I skip the molasses as I don't have any. I add pecans or almonds just to change it up a little every week. The next few weeks I will be substituting the raisins with cranberries. Add some chopped fresh berries in there to give a more summery flavor.

3. Cranberry Peanut Trail Mix

This one is not from a blog but from a patient of mine. We were chatting one day and she mentioned how she makes her trail mix with peanuts and cranberries. I have 2 big bottles of peanuts (Costco again!) in my pantry. So they got thrown together with cranberries, M and Ms, raisins and almonds. What a healthy and satisfying snack! I carry these in a ziplock in a purse and they come very handy.

Phew! That almost cleaned my pantry of cranberries