Barberries substitute

Best substitute

Dried cranberries, rinsed, chopped and acidulated

Use the same amount by volume, plus 1 to 2 tsp lemon juice per ½ cup as the barberries you are replacing

Best for zereshk polo

Taste and texture differ

The best available swap is dried cranberries, rinsed in hot water to wash off their sugar coating, chopped small and tossed with lemon juice: use the same volume, add 1 to 2 teaspoons of lemon juice per half cup, and cut any sugar the recipe calls for. Chopped dried sour cherries are the next best and are closer in actual sourness. Dried currants are the right size and chew but the wrong flavour, so they need a full tablespoon of lemon juice per half cup. The thing to understand is that barberries are not doing a fruit job in the recipe, they are doing an acid job. Each berry is a tiny sour burst that cuts through buttery saffron rice or a rich lamb stuffing, plus a flash of jewel-red colour. Every common substitute is sweeter than zereshk, so the fix is always the same: rinse off added sugar, add acid, and reduce the sugar elsewhere in the dish.

Other barberries substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Dried sour cherries, chopped small
Different taste
Use the same amount by volume, chopped into quarters
Closer to barberries in genuine sourness than anything else on a normal shelf, since these are tart cherries dried without much added sugar.
What changes
Best for
zereshk polo, rice with chicken, koofteh, stuffings, grain salads
The flavour is deeper and almost wine-like next to the clean sharp bite of zereshk, and the colour is garnet rather than scarlet, so the finished rice looks dark and jewelled instead of flecked bright red. Check the bag: some dried tart cherries are sweetened, in which case rinse them too.
3Dried currants plus a good hit of lemon
Different taste
Use the same amount by volume, plus 1 tbsp lemon juice per ½ cup
Zante currants are almost exactly the right size and chew, which matters more than you would think in a rice dish where the berries need to disappear into the grains.
What changes
Best for
jeweled rice, stuffings, koofteh, meatball fillings, pilaf
Flavour-wise they sit on the opposite axis: sweet, raisiny and mellow with no sourness at all. Soak them in the lemon juice for ten minutes before using, and add a pinch of citric acid if you keep it, which gets you much closer than lemon alone. Use these when the appearance and texture matter more than the sharpness.
4Fresh pomegranate seeds, for finishing only
Taste and texture differ
About ½ cup arils for 2 tbsp barberries
The best match for the sparkling jewelled look and the sour-sweet pop, scattered over the finished dish rather than cooked into it.
What changes
Best for
garnishing rice, jeweled rice, salads, roast chicken platters
They are wet, so they burst and bleed if they go anywhere near heat or get folded through hot rice, and they add no chew. Use them alongside a chewy substitute rather than instead of one, and add them at the table.
5Chopped dried apricot or golden raisin with lemon and sumac
Taste and texture differ
Use the same amount by volume, plus 2 tsp lemon juice and ½ tsp sumac per ½ cup
The genuine last resort, listed because it is what most kitchens actually have.
What changes
Best for
pilaf, stuffings, emergency swaps
These are unambiguously sweet fruits and the dish will taste sweet. The sumac is doing the real work, supplying tartness the fruit cannot. Chop them to barberry size and use less than the recipe states, roughly two thirds, so the sweetness does not take over.
6Nothing, honestly, when barberries are the point of the dish
Taste and texture differ
There is no true substitute for zereshk.
What changes
Nothing sold in a Western supermarket is that purely sour without also being sweet.
Best for
zereshk polo, deciding what to cook instead
In zereshk polo the berries are the title ingredient, so a sweetened cranberry version is a pleasant dish wearing the wrong name. Two better plans: make plain saffron rice (chelow) tonight and order zereshk online, since it keeps for months in the freezer, or cook morasa polo, jeweled rice, where slivered orange peel, pistachio, almond and currants share the work and no single ingredient has to carry it.

What is Barberries?

Barberries is Barberries, called zereshk in Persian, are tiny dried scarlet berries from the Berberis shrub that are fiercely sour rather than sweet, and they are scattered through Iranian rice dishes, stuffings and stews.

Cooking tips

Rinse barberries in a bowl of cold water before use and lift them out rather than pouring, because they are dried on the branch and there is almost always fine grit at the bottom of the bowl.
Zereshk burn in seconds. Fry them in butter over low heat for 30 to 60 seconds with a pinch of sugar and take the pan off the heat while they are still bright red. The moment they turn brown they go bitter, and there is no rescuing them.
Add them at the very end, scattered over or folded through the rice just before serving. Cooking them into a stew for an hour dulls the colour to a muddy brown and the sourness leaches out into the liquid.
Keep the bag in the freezer. Barberries lose their scarlet colour within a few months at room temperature, which is why supermarket packets sometimes look brown before you have opened them.
If your substitute is a sweetened dried fruit, adjust twice: remove the sugar the recipe adds to the fruit, and sprinkle half a teaspoon of sumac over the finished rice to put back the sour edge you are missing.

Frequently asked questions

Can I just leave barberries out?

Yes, and you will have a perfectly good plate of buttery saffron rice, which is a real Iranian dish in its own right called chelow. What you lose is the sourness, and it is more noticeable than you expect: without it the saffron and butter taste rich and slightly one-note, because the berries were the contrast. If you leave them out, squeeze a little lemon over the rice or serve something sour, like torshi or yogurt, alongside.

Are barberries the same as cranberries?

No. They are different plants and barberries are far more sour and much smaller, roughly the size of a grain of rice. Dried cranberries are also almost always sweetened, so a straight swap makes the dish sweet rather than tart. Rinsing off the sugar coating, chopping them and adding lemon juice closes most of the gap.

Can I use goji berries instead of barberries?

They look plausible in the bag and they are the wrong answer. Goji berries are sweet with an earthy, faintly savoury and slightly medicinal note, and they have a tougher, chewier skin. Dropped into zereshk polo they read as an odd flavour rather than a sour one. Dried cranberries or chopped dried sour cherries are far better.

Do barberries need soaking before I cook with them?

A short soak helps but a long one hurts. Rinse them, then let them sit in cold water for 10 to 15 minutes if they are very dry and brittle, and drain well. Any longer and the sourness and colour start leaching into the water, which is exactly what you were paying for.

Where do I buy zereshk?

Any Iranian, Afghan or general Middle Eastern grocery will have bags of them, often in the refrigerated or frozen section, and they are cheap. Online they are usually sold as dried barberries or zereshk. Buy a large bag and freeze it, since they keep well frozen and you will use them every time you make Persian rice.

Related substitutes

More fruits substitutes

Barberries substitute

Other barberries substitutes

2Dried sour cherries, chopped small

3Dried currants plus a good hit of lemon

4Fresh pomegranate seeds, for finishing only

5Chopped dried apricot or golden raisin with lemon and sumac

6Nothing, honestly, when barberries are the point of the dish