So, have you started getting ready for the “big meal” of the year? I know you are at least in the planning stages because traffic for some of my best holiday recipes has shot through the roof over the past couple of weeks. This time of year forcefully shoves all of us, even the “non-cooks”, into the kitchen. If you are still on the hunt for some new recipes to serve with your turkey and mashed potatoes, I promise you the best Thanksgiving feast yet if you try my Praline Sweet Potatoes, Amish Potato Rolls, and Parmesan Garlic Roasted Mushrooms.

As a kid, I never got the necessity of having cranberry sauce on the table for Thanksgiving, but that is probably because it always looked like something I should bounce off the floor instead of actually eating.

What kid wants to eat something that looks like a congealed tin can? Nasty!

I began making my own cranberry sauce from scratch about 10 years ago and now I absolutely adore this stuff. So sweet and tangy with small little pieces of fresh cranberries throughout. This stuff makes for the perfect bite on your fork with some turkey and gravy as well. So if you think you don’t like cranberry sauce, please take the 5 minutes required to make this awesome recipe and let me prove you wrong. It will become just as important to you as the turkey. Promise!

Homemade Cranberry Sauce

Print Recipe

Yield: 2 Cups 1x

Ingredients

Scale

12 ounce bag of fresh cranberries
1 C sugar
3/4 C water
1/4 tsp salt
zest of 1 large orange

Instructions

Chop the cranberries into small pieces. You can also leave them whole if you like bigger cranberries in your sauce.
In a medium saucepan over high heat, bring the sugar, water, salt and orange zest to a boil. Once it boils, add the cranberries and reduce the heat to medium. Cook for 5 minutes then transfer to a bowl and allow to cool. This can be made ahead of time and stored in the fridge for up to a week.