It’s the weekend before Christmas, everyone! I hope you’re all starting to get in the festive spirit, despite the lack of snow. Even though there’s no frost or snow on the horizon, the sunsets with the fog we’ve recently had have been spectacular. It’s like a mystical wonderland.
I made some cranberry sauce earlier in the week and I had a few questions on Instagram asking how I made it, so added a poll and it seemed that there were quite a few of you who wanted the recipe.
Cranberry sauce is truly easy to make and you can make it to your taste – tart, sweet, boozy, filled with clementine juice, fruit such as apple or pears, spices or all of the above! It is of course easy to buy it in jars, but to me, there is something special about serving your homemade cranberry sauce with your turkey or with a lovely supper, as modelled below by the handsome one.
I served the cranberry sauce in this beautiful jam dish, which actually belonged to his great grandmother and makes it that bit more special.
To make your own cranberry sauce you’ll need:
– A couple of sterilised jars depending on the size of them
– Heavy bottomed pan
– Cranberries (I used a 300g punnet)
– 2 star anise
– 3 clementines
– 6 tablespoons of port
– 1 cinnamon stick
– 3 whole cloves
– 1 small eating apple
– 3 tablespoons of unrefined caster sugar
As I said, this is totally open to interpretation -if you don’t like cinnamon or star anise, don’t put it in. If you prefer pears over apples then use a pear and if you prefer a sweeter cranberry sauce, add more sugar – you really can make this to whatever you want it to be and you could use wine instead of port or leave it out all together.
Begin by tipping your cranberries into your pan. Add your sugar, port, cinnamon stick, star anise and cloves. Don’t turn the pan on just yet.
Grab a fine grater and grate the zest of your clementines into your pan and then add the juice.
Peel your apple and dice into small chunks and chuck into the pan, then pop it onto a medium heat.
Once it starts bubbling and you hear the popping of the cranberries (along with the incredible smell!), turn it down to a low heat for about 20 minutes, keeping an eye on it and stirring constantly as it gets quite sticky. Remember you can taste it as it’s cooking – a bit too tart for your liking? Then add some more sugar. Can’t taste as much clementine as you’d like? Add some more juice.
When it looks like this, it’s done.
I like that the cranberries are still holding their form, but you could easily cook it for longer if you’d prefer. Then once it has cooled slightly, add into your sterilised jars and it will be ready to use straightaway.
You really can’t go wrong!
A x
Abi in the Garden 