Thanksgiving Cranberry Sauce
It only takes 20 minutes to make this delicious and vibrant Thanksgiving Cranberry Sauce. It’s made with orange, cinnamon, and spiced rum for a perfect pairing for turkey!
If canned cranberry products scare you, you’ve got to try making fresh cranberry sauce. It’s SO much better.
When I was a kid, I always thought of cranberry sauce as the stuff that made that creepy suction noise as it fell out of the can in one giant log…and jiggled anytime someone got up from the table.
…it’s alive! The cranberry sauce is alive!
So for most of my life I stayed away from it altogether.
I finally fell in love a few years ago when my friend Jess came to my house for Thanksgiving and showed me how to make homemade cranberry sauce with fresh cranberries.
Now this wonderfully bright and flavorful sauce is one of my favorite parts of the Thanksgiving meal, and it’s always the dish I make first.
It can be made several days in advance, and only takes about 20 minutes from start to finish.
If only all Thanksgiving dishes were that easy.
How to Make It Step by Step:
Start by sorting through a bag of fresh cranberries, and discard any cranberries that are shriveled or brown:
Next gather up an orange and the secret ingredient, which is…spiced rum!
I’m telling you, I’ve never been much of a drinker, but I think cooking with alcohol is one of the secrets to great cooking.
Adding spiced rum (or orange liqueur, which I like too) to the cranberries really enhances the flavor:
Zest a fresh orange or tangerine, then squeeze out all the juice.
Add the zest and juice to a pan with the cranberries, a cinnamon stick, and the spiced rum:
Add sugar and cook for 15 minutes until all the cranberries burst.
That’s really all it takes.
Sweet Potato Casserole, Potato Gratin, Roasted Acorn Squash, and Thanksgiving Stuffing are some of my other yearly staples for the big meal.
For dessert I make Lemon Buttermilk Pie, Bread Pudding, and Pumpkin Chip Gingersnap Cookie Ice Cream. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!
This cranberry sauce is vegan, gluten-free, and dairy-free.
Can Cranberry Sauce be frozen? Yes, for up to 2 months.
Can Cranberry Sauce be Made Ahead? Yes, it will keep in the fridge for up to 5-7 days.
Thanksgiving Cranberry Sauce
Ingredients
- 12 oz bag fresh cranberries
- 3/4 cup sugar*
- 1 softball sized orange zested and juiced
- 2 tbsp spiced rum
- 1 cinnamon stick
Instructions
- Sort through the cranberries, discarding any that look brown and shriveled.
- Rinse the cranberries and place them in a heavy bottomed saucepan with the sugar, orange zest, orange juice, spiced rum, and cinnamon stick.
- Place a lid on the pan and cook over medium heat for about 15 minutes, stirring every couple of minutes. The cranberries will begin to pop!
- When it looks like most of the cranberries have popped, remove the pan from the heat. If the sauce looks too liquidy, keep in mind that the pectin in the cranberries will make the sauce thicken up quite a bit as it cools. If you would like a thinner texture, you can add more water or orange juice.
- Serve the cranberry sauce cold or at room temperature. Enjoy!
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition is estimated using a food database and is only intended to be used as a guideline for informational purposes.
Post updated in November 2018. Originally published November 2013.
28 Comments on “Thanksgiving Cranberry Sauce”
Joanne, I made this yesterday and loved it. It was one of three types of cranberry garnish on our table, the only one without spice. When I tasted it my first thought was that I wanted it over vanilla ice cream — very yummy and so easy. 🙂
That’s wonderful Judy! And three types…you go all out! Hope you had a nice Thanksgiving.
i made this yesterday and it is soooo good! used grande manier as was suggested bc i didnt have spiced rum (next yr!) and it came out so good. thanks for the recipe!
YAY! That’s awesome Suzi. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
Just made this. Looks and smells great! Can’t wait to see how it tastes. Thanks for the recipe. Happy Thanksgiving!!
Happy Thanksgiving Samantha! Have a wonderful meal and holiday.
Homemade cranberry sauce is so wonderful. Love that you added rum!
I’m with you on cooking with alcohol. We’ve used Grand Marnier, but never rum. Must remedy that!
Haha, I know all too well that you guys love cooking with alcohol =) It’s such a great ingredient. Hope you enjoy the rum…I like it more than the Grand Marnier myself. Happy Thanksgiving!
I <3 U
There was much discussion on how much air you had to allow in the bottom of the can to get it to plop out just right into the dish and then it needed to be sliced attractively. I remember those days. We can’t buy fresh cranberries but we can get frozen so I’m never without homemade cranberry sauce. I love yours!
LOL!!! Maureen, this cracked me up. “The art of plopping cranberry” hahaha.
Wonderful and a must for Thanksgiving!
Wow! Your cranberry sauce looks awesome!
Oh my gosh.. had to laugh at your description of canned cranberry – it’s alive! so true. almost… scary.
pinning this! awesome sauce.
Spiked cranberry sauce is genius. What a pretty and perfect recipe!
This sounds and looks delicious! I adore cranberry sauce 😉
That has convinced me~I ALWAYS had jellied cranberries,This looks
Fantastic~YUM! Thanx for the recipe 🙂 🙂
Oh Sally you must try homemade then!
I agree, my mother did jelled cranberries, I switched to whole berries and now I always make my own. I do mine with apples, but I love the idea of rum.
Very neat Bonnie, I will try with apples next time!
I love your cute little heart-shaped Le creuset (and your spiked cranberry sauce!).
Thanks Kathy! It was a gift from my parents. Food people are so easy to shop for haha!
I love cranberry sauce, too, and actually made some fresh last night for our Thanksgiving get-together at work today! Love the idea of using spiced rum — delicious. Mine was more time-consuming than this (love this one!), but also included orange and cinnamon! (Plus a chopped pear, chopped apple, nutmeg and a little salt.)
Oh but the pear and apple sound worth it! I’ll have to try that sometime.
Cranberry sauce is my favourite part of Thanksgiving..which we Canadians have already celebrated. This is similar to the recipe I’ve used for years but mine is without the cinnamon stick. I love it on plain yogurt too. It gets gobbled up fast so one must hide a jar for other uses such as on chicken at least until Christmas. Since we enjoy Turkey at that time as well another batch will be made for this festivity of food. I will be making this recipe for sure!!
Hi Elaine, what a neat idea with the plain yogurt! Thanks