Cranberry sauce on turkey is gross. Same with applesauce on pork.
I concur. Cranberry sauce on turkey? Blech. You also need to add mashed potatoes, a touch of gravy, and some fine fresh-baked rye bread.
Cranberry sauce is awesome by itself, but I agree it destroys just about everything it touches. Mine gets placed carefully on the plate so as not to taint the other stuff.
But yeah, for some reason it’s OK as a mayo substitute on a sandwich.
I’ve never made it before - I don’t like the canned stuff - but this year while preparing the dinner I found a bag of cranberries my wife had bought and not used for something else and I thought, well hell we might as well use these.
The recipe I found online called for a 1/4 cup of port wine, which I didn’t have, in fact the only sweet liquor I had was limoncello. So I used that. Man, that cranberry sauce came out fabulous. Sweet/tart with a nice lemony tone. I’ll make that every year now.
My mother can’t have much sugar, so I whipped up a sugar free batch this year.
Two bags of cranberries, one container of frozen apple juice concentrate, and the juice of one orange. Cook 'till goopy, then a few seconds with the immersion blender, then some more cooking.
Delicious stuff.
I really want to try that limoncello version, though. What was the rest of the recipe?
Fruit juice contains sugar. Lots of sugar. In fact, diabetics are taught to use fruit juice as a treatment for a low blood sugar episode, as there’s lots of sugar that goes straight into the bloodstream.
It’s something about refined sugar. My mom is weird - I don’t question it. 
Ah, OK. The reason I answered as I did is because so many people think that fruit juice DOESN’T contain sugar, or doesn’t contain much sugar, when it’s really got quite a lot of sugar in it.
I like to put a little orange juice in diet Sprite. The OJ masks the artificial sweetener taste, and I can get away with having just a little bit of sugar.
I make my Great Grandmother’s cranberry relish… it’s not proper Thanksgiving without it… but I am always willing to buy a can for those persons who like lines on their cranberry sauce. shrug
The sprog came up with the idea of making cranberry sauce this year. This was the best idea he’s ever come up with. I used a cup of orange juice and a cup of sugar and a whole bag of berries, boiled the juice and sugar into a syrup before adding the berries, cooked the whole thing until the berries popped and mushed and the entire thing was a beautiful ruby-red color. I let it cool a bit before putting it in a container to refrigerate overnight. We made two batches the day before and a whole batch was gone by the time dinner ended. I might try this again with apple juice or cider to see how it tastes.
I was going to vote ‘canned’ because every homemade cranberry sauce I ever ate was not very good. Too tart, to hard, not very jellied, too sweet. . …
This year my daughter made cranberry sauce from an idea in her head-- no recipe. My daughter does NOT cook and when she does, it is ALWAYS carefully following a recipe so we got canned just in case.
Fresh cranberries, sugar and a some of muscato sparkling wine later. . … The can didn’t even get opened.
Congratulations on making such a wise choice!
I’ve experimented with varying the sugar amount and, at least for my tastes, can reduce it to 3/4 cup without being too tart. I go for 3/4 cup now. And add some orange zest, too. That really makes a difference.
I say canned, because I’ve never had the other kind that didn’t have the extra fruit in there. And the fruit always has too much concentrated cranberry flavor.
I’m sure you guys have made wonderful cranberry sauces, but I’ve never tried them. From what I’ve tried, I prefer the jellied kind.
You poor, lost soul!
Canned. Homemade is too much nuisance, not worth the effort.
In a good year when I remember, I make cranberry relish a week ahead of time. One bag of cranberries picked over, one medium orange with pith and seeds removed, one cup walnuts, 1-1 1/2 cup sugar. Grind together with medium spur, mix well, put in glass jars and let rest for a week. Delicious!!! Otherwise I love some sliced jelly.
Philistine!
This isn’t really a demonstration of anything because you never opened the can, so you have no idea how many would have eaten the canned sauce. Nobody, including me, is going to ask you to open a can. That would be rude.
Wha. . .? How do people in your house eat tuna fish if it’s rude for even you to open a can?
Wait, wait! You think there were people who ate Thanksgiving dinner in my house who would be hesitant to open a can of cranberry sauce? Nope, just the immediate household (all who cooked at least one dish) plus a brother-in-law who has lived with us and 2 cousins who opened the freakin’ chips after I told them not to. The cranberry sauce was raved about by all and the can wasn’t opened even after we ran out of the homemade stuff.