Get cooking!

It’s that time of year – we thought we’d share some of our favourite vegan recipes for festive treats.

The first is Mary Berry’s Christmas Chutney. Now, we’ve trialled this recipe so you don’t have to! Learn from our pain, and don’t repeat our mistakes.

So, whenever I make stuff like this, I like to make lots, because I jar it up and give it as gifts. I followed the recipe exactly, and it made about 6 small-ish jars. The official recipe states it makes about 6lb, if that means anything to you.

Here are your ingredients –

900g tomatoes

3 red peppers

1 large aubergine

1 green pepper

700g onions

4 garlic cloves

350g granulated sugar

300ml white wine vinegar

1tbsp salt

1 tbsp coriander seeds

1 tbsp paprika

2 tsp cayenne pepper

According to Mary, this should take you around 2 and a half hours – mine took closer to four, but that’s because I wasn’t certain of the consistency- it didn’t seem chutney-y enough for me, so I left it longer. It didn’t seem to thicken up too much, so I could probably have left it at the stated time. I also added a bit more sugar at the end, so just keep tasting it – you’ll know when it’s right for you!

First you need to peel your tomatoes – Mary gives a good tip – just prick the skins of the tomatoes and plonk them in boiling water- scoop them out after 30 seconds, the skins will just peel off. To be honest – I’ll be making this again this year, and I might not bother skinning the tomatoes, so miss this step out if you’d like.

Now chop the tomatoes, aubergine and peppers. Boil them up with your onions and garlic, then lower the heat and simmer, for about an hour.

Add the sugar, vinegar, salt, coriander, paprika and cayenne, and bring it back to the boil, for 30 minutes. It should be chunkys and sticky – this is the point where I lept mine boiling for a bit, so just go with the flow.

Jar it up, seal it while it’s still hot, and leave it to mature for a month before eating it. Voila! xox