Cranberry sauce provides some crucial vibrancy to Thanksgiving dinner. It adds a pop of color to the pallid browns, slightly lighter browns and oranges. And its tart may be the one distinct flavor that can slice through the amorphous blob of butter, grease, meat and starch melding together on your plate — not that there's anything wrong with that.
But despite its importance, cranberry sauce is often the biggest afterthought of the meal. People slave over mashed potatoes and stuffing, even when Stouffer's does a heck of a job. But cranberry sauce for many — and I refer even to friends and family I love and respect — comes straight from a can. And I mean straight from the can. Smashing it up with a spoon would ruin those artfully imprinted ridges that let you know it's authentically fresh from a can.
The social acceptability of cranberry sauce at Thanksgiving is madness, even by the lofty standards we've set in 2023 for deploying that term. Homemade cranberry sauce is delicious. It's also — almost literally — the easiest thing one can cook. It takes no time, and requires requires few ingredients. People fretting over what dish to contribute are missing out on the ultimate "get out of cooking and kick back to watch the Lions game with a beer for free" card.
What you need to make cranberry sauce
You need a stove and some form of pan or pot to heat things up in on that stove. You will also require a spoon and a measuring cup that can measure one cup. I'd also recommend a spoon to stir it around a little bit. It makes it feel a bit more like you're cooking.
Ingredients for cranberry sauce
- 12 oz cranberries
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 cup water (or orange juice)
You may be wondering how one measures out 12 ounces of cranberries. You don't need to. When you buy cranberries, they come in a bag ... a 12-oz bag. A cup of sugar is fairly straightforward. Other than that, you need water.
Note: my mother is from Cape Cod; we like pure, uncut cranberries. If you find the straight-up cranberries too tart, you can sweeten this by swapping in orange juice for the water. You can also add some orange zest if you're feeling fancy (though there's no need to feel fancy).
How to make cranberry sauce
Cranberry sauce is classic Puritan New England cooking: avoid temptation from devilish seasonings and boil the hell out of it. Here's how to put it through the crucible:
- Add the water and sugar to the pan.
- Turn up the burner to medium until it starts boiling (should take about five minutes).
- Dump in the bag of cranberries and turn down the heat a little. Set a timer for 10 minutes.
- After said 10 minutes, all of the cranberries should pop. You now have cranberry sauce.
- Cool it, put it in a bowl and plop it in the fridge. It will thicken. Serve sometime in the next couple of weeks (it lasts 10-14 days). Deploy for leftover sandwiches. You can also freeze it.
Optional: Keep a can opener and can of cranberry sauce in reserve to force that relative who insists they still prefer canned cranberry sauce to prove it.
Worried you’ll forget this complex recipe?
Fret not. Every bag of cranberries you buy will have this (or a startlingly similar) recipe for cranberry sauce on it. No one buys cranberries to do anything else.
