Spiced Cranberry Sauce

Growing up I always liked cranberry sauce at Thanksgiving, even though all my family ever did was open up a can of Ocean Spray. Imagine my surprise when many years later, I discovered the awesomeness of homemade cranberry sauce.

At Thanksgiving 2006, I found my forever cranberry sauce -- the kind I have been making every year since and will contine to make for ... well forever. That year, my editor Mike and his wife Alison invited us to celebrate the holiday at their house. I was three weeks away from having my first baby, so you can imagine how relieved I was not to be cooking. I had nothing else to do but stuff my face. What I remember the most: the cranberry sauce, spiced with cloves. I liked the cranberry sauce so much that Alison kindly shared the recipe, which she'd gotten from Mike's mom.

I've shared my forever cranberry sauce recipe with so many friends and  now with you, dear readers. Enjoy and have a very happy Thanksgiving!

XOXO,
Amy

PS: Check out Erin's Thanksgiving Round-Up, in which she offers up Citrus and Ginger Cranberry Sauce a la her mother-in-law.

Spiced Cranberry Sauce
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1 pound fresh cranberries
1 cup pineapple juice

Combine all items in a sauce pan and bring to a boil. Adjust heat down to medium or medium high and cook for 10-15 minutes. Serve hot or cold. This cranberry sauce can be kept in the refrigerator for several weeks or frozen, too.

One final thing: I always double this recipe so that there's enough for Thanksgiving leftovers and even some for Christmas. It's easy to do since the recipe calls for a pound of cranberries but Ocean Spray packages berries in 12 ounce bags; just buy three bags of berries to double.