Thanksgiving is the time of the year for turkey. One of the best toppings for a freshly roasted turkey is homemade cranberry sauce. While opening a can is easy, it just doesn’t taste as good as a cranberry sauce freshly made.
Things you’ll need to make your own cranberry sauce:
- 4c sugar
- 4c water
- 8c fresh cranberries
- optional: zest from one orange
The process for making cranberry sauce is actually pretty easy and the result can even be canned for later use.
First up add the sugar to the water in a large pot on the stove. Apply heat and bring to a boil. The goal here is to dissolve the sugar into the water.

Boiling sugar water
After about five minutes of boiling the sugar should be dissolved and the cranberries can now be added.
Before adding the cranberries make sure to give them a quick rinse in the sink to remove any dirt or debris. Now the cranberries and be dumped in and the pot brought back to a boil.

Cranberries in the pot
After a few minutes you’ll start to see, and hear, the cranberries bursting open. The mixture will form some foam on top which is normal. At this point the cranberry sauce will need to boil for about 15 minutes until all the berries have burst open and the liquid begins to form a sheet on a metal spoon.

Heating cranberries
I like the flavor the orange zest adds to the cranberry sauce so at this point I add in my zest.

Fresh orange zest
At this point the cranberry sauce is basically done.

Bursting cranberries
Since I like to enjoy seasonal foods all year long I ended up canning this batch of cranberry sauce, but you can easily freeze the cranberry sauce, or place it into the fridge for use later that day or the next day.

Freshly made cranberry sauce
Have a happy Thanksgiving and enjoy the homemade cranberry sauce!
– Jason Snell