Day 319.
It's Friday. Instead of fondue, you're getting cranberry sauce. It's a fair trade.
This worked! I've made cranberry sauce exactly once before---in a kindergarten class. We followed the directions on the bag, and it came out quite bitter. No one except this one little boy who enjoyed shocking his classmates with odd behavior would eat it. I could tell it was bitter just by the smell.
I did not have high hopes for cranberry sauce in the crockpot, but was pleasantly surprised. This not only worked, the kids each had some with leftover turkey and I've had it now a few times on top of spinach salad.
I think the secret is the enormous amount of sugar I added...
The Ingredients.
12 ozunces cranberries (fresh or frozen)
1/2 cup orange juice (freshly squeezed is best)
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
The Directions.
Use a 2- quart crockpot. If you only have a huge crockpot, you can put an oven-safe dish into it to create a smaller cooking vessel --- like a pyrex or Corningware. This is what I use in the crock (scroll down to see them).
Rinse off the cranberries and put them into your crockpot. Add the orange juice and water. I had the kids squeeze fresh juice, but you can use store-bought if that's what you have on hand.
Add the sugar and the cinnamon. Stir. There will be an awful lot of liquid, and the cranberries will float and you'll wonder how on earth it could possibly turn into cranberry sauce.
Cover and cook on high. It will take about 3 hours.
Stir every hour or so. When the skin from the cranberries has softened, the cranberries will "pop" when pushed with a spoon up against the side of the crock. It wasn't until about 2 hours in that my cranberries were soft enough to do this.
Smoosh all of the cranberries. Stir well.
Heat enough for it to be warm throughout. Take the lid off and heat on high for another 30 to 45 minutes. Your house will smell wonderful!
Serve. This easily can be made a few days before your holiday dinner.
The Verdict.
This is pretty much the best cranberry sauce in the history of the world. I like it so much I'll eat it right off the spoon. My mom makes batches and batches of it and gives it to her friends for gifts (seriously!) and freezes little Tupperwares of it so she can have it all year round.
if you like cranberry stuff, check out these dishes:
super easy cranberry pork or beef roast
potroast with cranberry and red wine glaze
turkey meatballs with cranberry barbecue sauce
cranberry party recipes: martini, chicken, cranberry surprise dessert!
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