Chocolate Covered Cranberries – An Easy Treat to Crave

These healthy and indulgent chocolate covered cranberries are sure to impress! With only two ingredients, you can whip up a batch any time. Just be careful if you hope to have some leftover to give as gifts. They can be addicting!

First, the chocolate

You can use any kind of chocolate you would like for this recipe. I used semisweet.

Fresh cranberries are quite tart. If they weren’t, we wouldn’t need the chocolate! If you are worried about not liking them because they are too sour, you can use a sweeter chocolate like milk chocolate or white chocolate.

I originally was planning to make these with dark chocolate for a superfood dessert. However, I ate a couple of the fresh cranberries plain and opted for the slightly sweeter semisweet.

I was wondering if I should have used milk chocolate while I was coating them. Once they were done, though, I was delighted with how they turned out!

If you really think fresh cranberries would be too sour for you, you can use dried cranberries instead, or strawberries or a sweeter fruit like cherries.

However, I was worried about this and I actually loved them, so I challenge you to give them a try! If you need further encouragement, cranberries are a great source of vitamin C, an antioxidant.

You can read more about the health benefits of cranberries here.

How long do cranberries keep in the fridge?

A package of fresh cranberries will keep around a month in the refrigerator. They do much better than most berries.

If you buy some cranberries and lose them in the back of the fridge, they will probably still be good when you find them.

You can make sure they are still fresh while you wash them and remove any stems. Cranberries should be quite firm and be able to bounce.

If they are soft, squishy, or too wrinkled, you should remove them from the good cranberries.

Chocolate won’t stick to wet berries, so you will either want to wash them early in the day, the night before, or be prepared to dry them well with an extra towel.

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How to melt chocolate

I used a saucepan over medium heat. This worked just fine. You can use a microwaveable bowl and heat it until the chocolate melts if you prefer. Some people also use a double boiler. I don’t own one, so I made due without.

Chocolate will burn, so if you use the stove, you won’t want to have it over medium heat the whole time. I turned mine down to low, then off completely, then back on as I was dipping the cranberries.

As soon as you smell the slightest hint that the chocolate may be burning, turn off the stove so your desserts don’t come out bitter. You will want the chocolate just melted enough to coat the fruit. It can still be in the shape of the chips.

Chocolate covered cranberries ingredients

Before you begin, you will need:

Edible Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups fresh cranberries, washed and completely dried
• 1 cup chocolate chips or baking chips (I used semisweet.)

Tools and Equipment

• A saucepan or a microwaveable bowl
• Toothpicks or a spoon/silicone spatula
• Parchment paper
• A surface to chill them on, like cookie sheets or plates
• An apron, depending on how enthusiastically you twirl your toothpicks

How to make chocolate covered cranberries

1. First, pour your chocolate chips into your saucepan and place it over medium heat. Cover a cookie sheet or plates with parchment paper.
2. While the chocolate is heating, skewer your cranberries on toothpicks for more picture perfect candies. The toothpicks are optional but they look pretty.
3. Once the chocolate looks shiny, it’s usually melted enough to begin. Twirl each cranberry in the chocolate until evenly coated. Place your candy on a cookie sheet covered with parchment paper to cool. Once you have covered 1/2 cup or so of cranberries you can probably turn off the stove but leave the chocolate on the burner to stay warm.
4. After you have coated around 1 cup of cranberries this way with toothpicks, the chocolate at the bottom of the pan will likely be quite thin. At this point, I just dumped the remaining cranberries into the pan and used a spoon to coat the cranberries with chocolate and then fished them out and place them on the parchment paper. Once the chocolate got very low I switched to a silicone spatula, which also make cleanup really easy. You may have to turn the stove back on to keep the chocolate melted. These ones don’t look quite as pretty, but still look nice and taste great!
5. When you run out of chocolate, place your trays/plates of candy in the refrigerator for 15 minutes, then dig in! Keep refrigerated until ready to eat.

That’s it! I hope you enjoy these chocolate covered cranberries! If you try them out, please let me know how you liked them by rating the recipe or leaving me a comment.

Tip

If you freeze these, when you take them out they will sweat and not look as nice, so bear that in mind. This could make the chocolate coating come off if they sweat too much.

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Variations on chocolate covered cranberries

You can use any type of chocolate you like to make:

Dark chocolate covered cranberries

Milk chocolate covered cranberries

White chocolate covered cranberries

Or, of course, you can use bittersweet chocolate or semisweet, as shown here.

To decorate your candies, you could use a topping while the chocolate is still melted, like shredded coconut, sprinkles, sea salt, sugar, crushed peanuts, cocoa nibs, etc.

If you are up to melting two kinds of chocolate, you could drizzle white chocolate over the candies once they have cooled. Then you may as well make some white chocolate covered cranberries while you’re at it!

While you have melted chocolate, feel free to also coat a variety of berries, nuts, or whatever else you like with chocolate for a truly decadent dessert.

Are dark chocolate covered cranberries good for you?

Yes, they are!

WebMD definitively calls cranberries a superfood, and suggests that dark chocolate may also be a superfood due to its high antioxidant content.

Feel free to enjoy this treat both for the taste and the antioxidants!

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Related dessert recipes

You may also enjoy my vegan chocolate covered strawberries!

If you enjoyed candy making, consider my vegan hot chocolate bombs.

In addition, these marbled cookie brownies feature the same chocolate cranberry combination as this recipe.

I hope you love these chocolate covered cranberries!