Whole berry cranberry sauce in little jars

Thanksgiving is next week! Seven days from now! 

Yes, I am a bit excited about roasting a turkey and sitting down to a traditional dinner. The two of us will be on our own again, and you know what? We really rather prefer it that way. We've had the big dinners with the clan gatherings, which are stressful. There is no stress when it's us in our cozy little house in the woods.

We aim to eat close to one o'clock. No one shows up at noon to try to "help." The turkey is done when it gets done. I always liked to make some sort of baked veggie casserole to make my mother happy and forget that. I'll open a can or a jar (or two) of veggies and nuke 'em. The Lord of the Manor makes the candied sweet potatoes the day before - just heat and serve. He'll also make biscuits. He does have a few culinary talents so I make use of them on Thanksgiving. But I digress...

Cranberry sauce is a traditional part of our dinner. While at the grocery, I noticed they had fresh cranberries on sale. There's a recipe for cranberry sauce in the Ball book, so I got a bag and preserved eight half-pint jars of whole-berry cranberry sauce. There's also half a jar in the fridge and it is good! 

There are two upsides to this. This sauce contains cranberries, orange zest, and sugar. That's it. No additives with strange names. Get over the fact it has sugar in it. We believe the chemicals are worse.  The other thing is that these portions work better for two people. We won't be discarding the last third of the can because it sat in the fridge and went to water. 

Maybe the third thing is cost. On the surface, four dollars worth of cranberries made enough for at least eight meals. An industry can cost at least a dollar and a half for one. Even figuring in the cost of the sugar and one orange, it's cheaper to make at home. 

My next trip to the grocery, I'm going to get another bag of cranberries and put them in the freezer. It's not that I don't trust our supply chain...Oh, yes. It's definitely that. 

The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)

Holly Tree Manor, The Hideaway, cranberry sauce, home food preservation, Thanksgiving, rural lifestyle, country living, family stress, simple country pleasures, supply chain