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Cranberry sauce is a must in my book for Thanksgiving. In fact, I’ve been known to serve it with roasted chicken anytime of the year. This AIP, paleo, refined sugar free version will take you under 20 minutes and only 4 ingredients, not counting sea salt and water!
It’s unfortunate that most canned cranberry sauce is loaded with refined sugar.
The ingredients of a popular brand of cranberry sauce read: cranberries, high fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, water.
Because one form of corn syrup wasn’t enough? OY!
Clearly, that leaves very little nutrition to be had. The benefit of making this tasty side dish homemade is controlling what goes in. In this case, fresh cranberries, organic honey, coconut sugar, lemon juice, water, and sea salt.
I must provide a disclaimer. This recipe is not extremely sweet like store-bought varieties. Instead, this is tart with subtle sweet undertones. As a lover of canned jellied cranberry sauce, I starting loving the tartness of this one. It adds a freshness that gives cranberry sauce new life.
Feel free to add more of either sweetener to your liking and/or less lemon juice.
Although I totally recommend using this easy recipe to make your own cranberry sauce, if you need a quick option for a store-bought one, all of these options are available on Amazon:
Woodstock Farms (jellied)
Woodstock Farms (whole berry)
Pacific Organic (whole berry)
365 Organic (jellied)
365 Organic (whole berry)
(The above options do contain organic sugar).
The longer you let this simmer on the stove, the more jellied it will be and less “whole berry.”
Are you on Team Cranberry Sauce? I couldn’t imagine Thanksgiving without it! What do you prefer, homemade or store-bought and jellied or whole berry?
4-Ingredient Cranberry Sauce (AIP, Paleo, Refined Sugar Free)
SERVES 6+
Ingredients
1/2 cup water
Juice of 1 lemon (use this to get the most juice out!)
3/4 tsp sea salt
3 tbsp organic honey
1–3 tsp coconut sugar, to taste*
12 ounces fresh, whole cranberries
Instructions
- Set a saucepan on medium-low heat with all ingredients except for the cranberries.
- Stir until all ingredients are combined. Add the cranberries and turn up to medium.
- Keep an eye on it while stirring occasionally. After 10 minutes as most cranberries have opened and the sauce is getting thicker, lower the heat down to medium-low.
- Keep stirring and keep on heat until the cranberry sauce is to the consistency you like.
Notes
Adding 0-1 tsp of coconut sugar yields a tart cranberry sauce. Add the full 3 tsp if you like it sweeter.
