Molded Cranberry Sauce Recipe

There are some aspects of the Thanksgiving dinner that are musts. Many of us simply can’t comprehend a Thanksgiving meal without turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, and stuffing. Another of these essentials is cranberry sauce. Growing up cranberry jelly came out of a can. I still remember the cylindrical shape of the reddish, purplish, pink jelly cut into slices. However, years later when my husband and I started a family and began hosting Thanksgiving dinners I tried making homemade cranberry sauce the first year. Wow! Where has this been my whole life? Once I tried that there was no going back. Homemade, whole berry sauce is a must on the table now. And this year we are trying molded cranberry sauce recipe for variety.

Cranberry sauce is an easy and fun recipe to experiment with. Over the years, I’ve made many varieties including cranberry sauce with ingredients such as zinfandel, candied orange peel, spices, club soda, and more. One version of cranberry sauce I haven’t experimented with yet is molded cranberry sauce. Many versions of molded sauce call for jello which I wanted to avoid, so I experimented a bit with gelatin. Then I saw a recipe using the natural pectin in apples to create a molded cranberry sauce. The original version is here. Hmmmmmmm, this was intriguing, so I tried it with a few changes of my own.

The first change I made was to use a green apple instead of the fuji apple. Green apples have a nice tangy taste and are also one of the highest sources of pectin. The pectin is what firms the cranberry sauce up to a molding consistency, so don’t leave this out! Also, I swapped out the water for cranberry juice for more cranberry flavor. Organic cane sugar is used in this recipe, but white sugar works just as well. That’s it! Four ingredients are all that is in this recipe unless you add the optional orange liqueur in which case 5 ingredients are needed 🙂

If not using a fancy mold then try using a small springform pan and decorating the top with herbs, cranberries, etc. Use your imagination!

Molded Cranberry Sauce recipe

Makes approx. 3 cups of cranberry sauce

1 green apple

12 oz. fresh or frozen cranberries

1 cup of cranberry juice or water

1 1/4 cup of sugar

Optional: 2 tbsps. of orange liqueur (I used Harlequin Orange Brandy)

Suggested garnishes: apples, cranberries, rosemary, orange slices, etc.

Begin by oiling or greasing your mold- don’t forget to do this! Next, remove apple peel and core. Run apple through food processor. Add chopped apple, cranberries, cranberry juice, and sugar in pot and bring to a boil over high heat. Once the sauce is boiling turn the heat down to medium. Continue to boil gently for approximately 20 minutes or until sauce is really thick. If desired, add 2 tbsps. of orange liqueur at this point. Pour sauce into greased mold and refrigerate until firm. Serve with your Thanksgiving dinner! Enjoy!

decorate the top with rosemary and cranberries.