Category: Side dishes

Jerri’s Cranberry Sauce and Relish

For the past twenty years or so, Jerri and I have been buying ten pounds of fresh cranberries each fall at marshes near Stone Lake. Wisconsin. Cranberries freeze well, so we measure three cups into quart freezer bags and in half an hour have a year’s supply of the luscious fruit. Before that we used to buy cranberries at the supermarket for our Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, but this way we save some money, see some beautiful country and enjoy visiting with the people who sort, clean and sell the berries.

If you live in western or northern Wisconsin you might want to set aside a weekend next fall to attend one of the cranberry festivals celebrating the official state fruit and most important fruit crop in Wisconsin. The two nearest festivals that we have been to are at Stone Lake and Warrens. Both feature a weekend of activities which include tours of local marshes where you can buy fresh berries.

In the mid 1990’s, Wisconsin became the largest cranberry producer in the United States. Last year, Wisconsin cranberry growers sold 483 million pounds of the tart fruit, 60 percent of the total crop in the United States. Massachusetts, which once led the nation in cranberry production, was the second largest producer with 212.3 million pounds.

People like cranberries. Over 94 percent of Thanksgiving dinners include cranberry sauce, most in the form of jellied cranberry sauce sold in cans. Only five percent of cranberries are sold as fresh fruit, but once you taste your own cranberry sauce, my guess is that you will be making it again.

Canned cranberry sauce is sweetened with high fructose corn syrup, which is cheaper than sugar because of farm subsidies. However, we think that sugar gives a better flavor, and I hope that you use it to make your own cranberry sauce this year.

Making cranberry sauce is easy. It takes less than fifteen minutes plus of course the time for the sauce to cool. Here is Jerri’s recipe.

INGREDIENTS:

3 cups cranberries, fresh or frozen
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups water

PROCEDURE:

Bring the sugar and water to a boil for about five minutes in a two quart saucepan. Add the berries and bring the mixture to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to medium and cook the sauce until most of the cranberries have burst, stirring occasionally.

Remove the pan from the heat. Stir the sauce for a half minute or so and allow the sauce to cool. Transfer it to a serving dish or storage container and refrigerate before serving.

NOTES: Buying cranberries in bulk and freezing them in three cup packages makes it easy to enjoy cranberries in all seasons. Here are four good recipes.

First, here is one for an uncooked cranberry orange relish that Jerri makes at least a couple of times a year. It’s great with roast pork, lamb, turkey or chicken. Like her cranberry sauce recipe, this one also has just three ingredients.

INGREDIENTS:

3 cups fresh or frozen cranberries
1 orange
1 1/2 cups sugar

PROCEDURE:

Grind or chop the cranberries fairly fine. If we had a food processor, we would use that. Jerri chops the berries in smaller batches in the blender and chops the few by hand that keep bouncing around in the blender jar.

Wash and dry the orange and remove the zest with a zester or the smallest holes on a kitchen grater. Peel the orange, chop the sections into small pieces and discard any seeds with the rind. Stir the berries, zest, chopped orange and sugar together in a bowl. Put the relish in a storage container, cover and refrigerate for at least a day.

Delicious!

Here are three more recipes that are well worth your while.

Cranberry Apple Pie

Cranberry Crumb Coffee Cake

Cranberry Raisin Pie

Leek and Potato Soup

One Saturday morning I saw some wonderful fresh leeks at the farmers’ market and could not resist. Jerri approved the purchase with the condition that I do something with them. I checked out leek soup recipes, made some modifications and came up with this version. It is easy to make, tastes even better the second day, and is a wonderful cold weather treat.

Leeks are related to onions and garlic but have a very mild flavor. Combined with potatoes, leeks produce a soup that is absolutely delicious. Leeks are sometimes used instead of onions to add flavor to soup stocks without overpowering the other ingredients in the stock. That’s what leeks do in leek and potato soup–let you enjoy the flavor of the potatoes, chicken broth and cream along with a hint of onion.

We usually make this soup a couple of times a year, in midsummer when leeks first appear at the farmers’ markets and then in the late fall when leeks are still available at the markets and the days are cool. Even if you count the time spent simmering the vegetables in the broth, you can put a big pot of delicious soup on the table in under two hours.

INGREDIENTS:

4 or 5 medium potatoes (about 1 lb.)
3 or 4 leeks (about 1 lb.)
2 T butter
8 cups chicken broth
1/2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup flour
1/2 cup cold water
1 cup whipping cream
Parsley for garnish

PROCEDURE:

Peel and dice the potatoes. Wash the leeks thoroughly, remove the roots and trim the green part so about 1 1/2 inches of the light green remain. Cut each leek in half and peel back the green part to make certain that no sand remains inside. Rinse if necessary, then slice the leeks thinly.

Heat the butter in an eight quart pot and sauté the leeks slowly until they are wilted but not browned. Add the potatoes, broth, salt and pepper. Simmer for an hour. Puree the vegetables in a food mill or blender and return them to the pot. Mix the flour into the cold water and stir into the soup.

Add the cream and bring the soup to a simmer for five minutes to cook the flour and let the soup thicken. Check the seasoning and add salt or pepper if necessary. Garnish with chopped parsley.

Serve with sandwiches for lunch or as a first course for dinner. Makes enough for four hungry hunters or ten dinner guests.

NOTE: Don’t even think of not using heavy cream for this recipe. It’s just one cup in three quarts of soup.