Cranberry Sauce

Eliza Leslie included a recipe for Cranberry Sauce in 1840 using brown sugar.


The cranberry sauce in the photo was boiled then put in a slack oven. Remove and add a wineglass (1/4C) of brandy.

CRANBERRY SAUCE. --Wash a quart of ripe cranberries, and put them into a pan with about a wine-glass of water. Stew them slowly, and stir them frequently, particularly after they begin to burst. They require a great deal of stewing, and should be like a marmalade when done. Just before you take them from the fire, stir in a pound of brown sugar.When they are thoroughly done, put them into a deep dish, and set them away to get cold.You may strain the pulp through a cullender or sieve into a mould, and when it is in a firm shape send it to table on a glass dish. Taste it when it is cold, and if not sweet enough, add more sugar. Cranberries require more sugar than any other fruit, except plums.Cranberry sauce is eaten with roast turkey, roast fowls, and roast ducks.
Leslie, Eliza. Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches. Philadelphia: 1840

In "Aunt Babette's" Cook Book, 1889: Never sweeten while cooking; it injures the color. Better prepared the day previous to using.

Cranberry Sauce recipes can be found in Thanksgiving - Cranberries: Pemmican to Cranberry Sauce.

©2009 Patricia Bixler Reber
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