Cranberry sauce is a holiday tradition. And this tart and sweet honey fermented cranberry sauce is fresh, flavorful, and delicious. It’s also perfect for helping with the digestion of a heavy holiday meal.
Best of all this cranberry sauce is incredibly easy. There’s no cooking involved! Just whip the ingredients together in a blender, pour it into a jar and you’re done!
Serving Options
There’s an obvious holiday association with cranberry sauce. However, this delicious sweet and tart sauce has lots of serving options.
- With baked brie for a holiday appetizer.
- As jam or jelly in a peanut butter sandwich or stirred into a bowl of yogurt.
- A sauce for pancakes, waffles, or ice cream.
- Make a cranberry sauce salad dressing.
Storing Leftover Fermented Cranberry Sauce
Unlike store-bought cranberry sauce, fermented cranberry sauce will last quite a while in the fridge. Here are a few long-term storage options.
- Long ferment: Kept in a cool, dark location, cranberries can be left to ferment for several months. The sauce will become less sweet and the cranberries will become softer overtime. So I don’t usually leave my cranberries to ferment for more than a week. However, if you want to ferment for longer, just be sure to use a fermentation-specific jar, like a fido or airlock. And santize the jar to prevent contamination.
- Fridge: Fermented condiments will last for several months in the fridge. Just be sure to use a clean spoon for serving. And if you’ve served cranberry sauce in a dish at your holiday table, don’t expect it to last longer than a few weeks in the fridge.
- Freezer: Cranberry sauce will still be deliciously probiotic after several months in a deep freezer.
Alternatives to raw honey
I’ve designed this recipe to be a sweet ferment. It’s a simplified version of traditional cranberry sauce. If sweet is not your cup of tea, then check out my recipe for savory rosemary and balsamic cranberry relish. It is a salt-brined, Lacto-bacteria ferment.
Fermenting with raw honey is really easy and reliable. However, there are other options.
Yeast-based fermented beverages (like water kefir, kombucha, or ginger bug) are perfect for fermenting fruit. I have a bunch of these sorts of recipes on my blog, like my recipe for fermented strawberries.
To ferment with a probiotic beverage, replace the honey with 1/4 to 1/2 cup of sugar and 1/4 cup of unflavored probiotic beverage. The exact amount of sugar will depend on how sweet you want the cranberry sauce to be.
Fermented Cranberry Sauce
Fermented cranberry sauce has a bright, fresh flavor that is perfect as part of a heavy holiday meal. This honey-sweetened cranberry sauce is delicious turkey or brie. See the sections above for other serving options as well as long-term storage advice.
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 10 minutes
- Yield: 2 cups 1x
- Category: Condiment
- Method: Fermented
- Cuisine: Holiday
- Diet: Vegetarian
Ingredients
- 1 orange
- 12 oz cranberries (3 cups)
- 1/4 to 1/2 cup of raw honey (see the section above for other culturing options)
Instructions
- Zest and juice the orange.
- Wash the cranberries, and remove any that have started to wrinkle.
- Place cranberries, orange juice, and orange zest in a blender.
- Pulse until the cranberries are crushed. It can be thin and smooth or chunky like a relish. I like a roughly chopped mix with some whole berries.
- Scrape the blended cranberries and orange into a glass jar for fermenting. Stir in the honey. Fermenting cranberries will bubble and build up carbonation, so don’t cap with an air-tight lid.
- Ferment in a cool, dark location. It should start to bubble and froth after 24 hours. If you want to ferment it for longer than 24 hours, then stir it once a day to mix the floating cranberry pulp into the ferment. It will become less sweet the longer it ferments, so I generally only ferment for one week.
- Cap with an air-tight lid and store in the refrigerator. See the section above for long-term storage advice.
- Depending on how much honey you use, and how much juice you get out of the orange, your sauce may have too much liquid. Simply strain off the excess liquid before serving. The extra liquid is delicious mixed with sparkling water for a cranberry-flavored drink!
Notes
- Because of the health risks associated with the consumption of raw honey, this ferment is not recommended for pregnant women, children under the age of 1 year, or anyone who may be immunocompromised.
- This ferment relies on the natural yeasts and bacteria in honey. Be sure to use honey that is labeled raw or unpasteurized.
- See the section above for details on using fermented beverages rather than raw honey in this recipe.
Keywords: Thanksgiving, Christmas, turkey, brie, gluten free, probiotic, traditional, easy, 3 ingredients or less, no-cook
I loved this recipe! It’s a bit tart for my taste, so I added a bit more honey and yum! Perfect!
★★★★★
Great! Glad it worked for you.
Thanks too you. your recipe gave me a 100% on my superbowel menu
Great!
Going to make this. I know I will love it. Can I use frozen cranberries?
Yes, provided they aren’t freezer burned. Raw honey is really good at fermenting pretty much anything. Enjoy!