Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread is a flavorful holiday appetizer with cream cheese, cranberries, apricots, and orange zest ready in minutes!
Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread has all the ease of making a traditional Cheese Ball but is packed full the classic holiday flavors of cranberry and orange. It’s one of the many cheesy holiday Appetizer Recipes that that will go just as perfectly on your Thanksgiving table as it will on your leftover turkey sandwiches.
CRANBERRY CREAM CHEESE SPREAD
The holiday season is quickly approaching, and it’s the perfect time to try new delicious appetizers to serve at your Christmas party. This Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread is all about flavor: it’s a blend of tangy with smooth and savory with sweet.
The result is an incredibly yummy holiday appetizer that looks great on any serving plate and will keep your guests coming back for more.
Cranberry Cream Cheese is one of the easiest appetizer recipes you’ll ever make. All you do is mix the ingredients together in a large bowl until they are completely mixed and voila! You’re ready to serve it. It can be made ahead of time, so if it’s getting down to crunch time for a party, you can throw it together the day before and move on to the next thing on your list.
When it’s party time, serve Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread with an assortment of crackers and breads. I like to make one large platter of mini toasts, water biscuits, sliced baguettes, wheat thins, Triscuits, pretzels, pita chips, and other crackers.
Having a single big tray of assorted “dippables,” and then arranging all your dips and spreads around it, makes it easier for guests to mix and match what they want to try.
This nice thing about this cream cheese spread is that it doesn’t just have to be an appetizer. The dried fruit and the cream cheese make for a tastier, healthy alternative to mayo and cheese on a turkey sandwich.
It also works great on bagels, an energizing and tasty breakfast to help you power through a long weekend of holiday shopping and visiting with relatives.
MORE CHEESE APPETIZERS FOR THE HOLIDAYS
Queso Dip
Ultimate Spinach Artichoke Dip
Cheese Ball
Cheesy Beef Rotel Dip
HOW TO MAKE CRANBERRY CREAM CHEESE SPREAD
- In a large bowl, whisk together the cream cheese, chopped cranberries, chopped apricots and orange and ginger until well combined.
- Refrigerate for one hour before serving.
- Serve with crackers.
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FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Try mixing in some finely chopped pecans, cashews, or walnuts for a hearty crunch. You can also dice up some green onions and stir them into the spread, or drizzle lemon juice over the top to add more citrus flavor.
To give your cream cheese spread some kick, finely dice some jalapeños and add them in. Make sure you deseed the jalapeño pepper before dicing and adding to your spread.
While the cranberries definitely add a festive touch, you can easily swap the fruit for ones you like better. Dried cherries or currants would still have that holiday flavor and taste just as delicious.
Do yourself a big favor and try a Cranberry Cream Cheese turkey sandwich. The Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread is rich and compliments the turkey so much that you don’t really need to add much else to make a perfect Thanksgiving leftovers lunch.
To make this a creamier and cranberry-er spread, blend some Cranberry Sauce with your cream cheese. Once combined, add in your mixed fruit and orange zest.
Because of the complexity of the flavors in the spread itself, you want to choose a tasty cracker that is not too strong. The cracker shouldn’t be completely bland, but it should have a milder flavor palate. Try Ritz crackers, or Braton crackers depending on your preference, just be sure to stay away from sweet crackers.
MORE HOLIDAY APPETIZER RECIPES
Cocktail Meatballs
Buffalo Wings
Buffalo Chicken Dip
Brown Sugar Bacon Wrapped Smokies
HOW TO STORE CRANBERRY CREAM CHEESE SPREAD
- Serve: You should not leave your Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread out for longer than 2 hours at room temperature.
- Store: Make sure that you wrap Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread with plastic wrap or put it into a sealable bag and refrigerate. In the fridge, the Cream Cheese Spread will stay good for up to 2 weeks.
- Freeze: Freezing cream cheese is doable, but it will alter the texture. When cream cheese freezes, ice crystals form in the liquid parts of it and then when they thaw, they never return to their original state.
Ingredients
- 8 ounces cream cheese
- 1/2 cup dried cranberries , chopped
- 1/2 cup dried apricots , chopped
- 2 tablespoons orange juice
- 1 teaspoon orange zest , grated
- 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger , optional
Instructions
- In a large bowl, whisk together the cream cheese, chopped cranberries, chopped apricots, orange juice, orange zest and ground ginger until well combined.
- Refrigerate before serving.
- Serve with crackers, fruit or sliced baguettes.
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My new fave dip! I followed comments and added a diced jalepeno. AMAZING! Easy and delicious, what more could you ask for? Thanks for posting! This is a keeper!
You’re welcome Patty and great idea to add diced jalepeno! Appreciate the five star review!
Made this for the first time today. Yum! It’s a keeper.
What can you use instead of apricot
Apricot fruit can be substituted with any type of fruit that is of the same consistency. Let us know what you decided to go with Cynthia and how your Cranberry Cream Cheese Spread turned out!
This is so good, added a nice good size seeded jalapeno pepper, rolled it in pecan pieces soo addictive . It made it in the Meller Holiday Recipe book thanks for sharing.
I made this dip for my first attempt at a Christmas charcuterie board, I took to work. I omitted the ginger (I’m not a fan) and everyone loved it! Great recipe!
Could you do this as a cheeseball you think? Or is it not the right consistency for that?
Great idea but it would be hard to form into a ball I think. If you try it, let us know!
Did you use powdered ginger or grated fresh ginger?
Ground ginger.
Can this be used to fill tiny colorful peppers?
Absolutely, it would be delicious spread inside mini bell peppers.
This appetizer was a hit at my bunco gathering! I substituted the Philadelphia cream cheese with jalapeño to give it a little kick!
I added chopped candied pecans, dried chopped cherries and a jalapeño. Out of this world!!
Delicious!! Only changes added 1/3 cup chopped pecans
It was a little too sweet for me, so I skipped the orange rinds and add pecans.
That worked for me
Just tried this for pinochle club. Big hit. I didn’t have dried apricots but used dried mangoes. I see another review added pecan pieces. Ill try that too. I think many variations of this recipe could work. Very tasty. The orange juice and ginger are the keys.
This is yummy added bacon!!
I made this and it was delicious!Thank you so much!
Delicious. Served with Carr’s crackers. We thoroughly enjoyed this prior to dinner…next time may add chopped pecans.
I love the orange-cranberry recipes, and can’t wait to try this. However, since I don’t care foe apricots, I think I’ll substitute coarsely chopped pecans. Thanks for sharing.
This sounds wonderful. What are your thoughts on blending in a bit of goat cheese?
Sounds amazing! I’d add in about 4 ounces of crumbled goat cheese. Yum!
Thank you so much for this recipe! I can’t wait to try it with my husband on Christmas Eve this year! Merry Christmas to you!
You’re welcome, Connie!
Hello, I am planning on making this for Thanksgiving & was wondering if putting chopped dates would blend well with the other ingredients?
Yes, they’d probably be DELICIOUS! I would totally try that. I’d even do a version with blue cheese and dates together. Love dates in savory appetizers.
Thank you for responding to my question. I will let you know how it goes. Excited about trying this. Happy Thanksgiving!!?
Happy thanksgiving!
can I use dried cranberrys and apricots chopped up
This recipe uses those items. I hope you enjoy it.
Would diced mandarin oranges work?
I made this for New Years Eve, it was delicious and loved by all! I doubled the recipe, added green onions and three tablespoons of whole cranberry sauce with three tablespoons of orange juice. Served with ritz crackers and sea salt pita chips. The flavor was wonderful! Thank you so much for this new recipe for my recipe box!
I’m so glad to hear it was a hit, Patti. Thanks so much for the 5 stars.
I know that you mentioned not to eat this on something sweet, but you should really try this dip with the thin ginger snaps. YUM!
I’ll have to give it a try, thanks!
I like your idea of having a platter of different crackers, etc., and then setting out several different kinds of dips/cheese spreads. Along with this Cranberry Cheese Spread, can you suggest other spreads/dips to serve along with this one? (I can’t wait to try this one!)
I love having different ones to satisfy all my guests. Smoked salmon spread or even a classic artichoke dip would definitely be on my list to add. Enjoy!
I want to take this to a party that will last 4to5 hours. You said don’t leave it out over 2 hours. How can I address this Robles????
I would either make a few batches and change them out after 2 hours (if there’s any left) or place the dish in a bowl of ice to stay cooler than room temperature.