Before you read the long dissertation below, have you checked out the giveaway this week yet?
I’ll be first to admit I can be a very, very, very, verrrrryyyy petty person and hold grudges. Years ago, when I was first blogging on my Trail Cooking website (so long ago it had a different name!), I got into a snit-fit with a certain cranberry company (lets call them “O.S.”) and their legal department. I was sent a very unpleasant email from their legal department because I had forgotten to use a “™” symbol after 1, yes, 1, reference to a certain dried cranberry product they market. Every other reference of it had it on my site, and all had links to the product page and the product names were capitalized. A simple “Hey, can you fix that?” would have been a quick fix. But no, I got a threatening letter from legal, telling me all the horrid things they would do to me. I instead went through my site and removed EVERY reference to the company, and a good 8-9 years later have avoided buying anything from them. So…..making fresh cranberry sauce can be a fun one come the Holidays. Why? Because the majority of the cranberries grown in the US are sold to this company. If I search hard enough, I can find independent farms selling their berries frozen. This year I scooped up a 5 pound bag frozen, from a farm on the border of Canada here in Washington.
Anyhow, petty grudges aside, this was an interesting take on the traditional whole cranberry sauce – it is almost a fruit preserve. Perfect for serving as a side dish, or even better, spread thickly on sandwiches.
Cranberry Cherry Sauce
Ingredients:
- 1 pound cranberries, fresh or frozen
- 1½ cups Dried Cherries
- 1½ cups granulated sugar
- ¾ cup orange juice
- Fine sea salt
Directions:
In a tall saucepan, combine cranberries, dried cherries, sugar, and organe juice. Heat over medium-high until simmering, reduce heat to medium, let simmer until the cranberries burst open, and the sauce is thickened, to jam-like.
Take off the heat, season to taste with salt (a good pinch to start). Let cool down before stashing in a serving bowl and refrigerating until cold.
Make in advance and store chilled for up to a week.
Enjoy with a side of long-holding grudges 😉