Frankly, if your family only likes what it's used to, it may be a wasted effort. I am not saying that to be insulting.

People often have very specific and fixed preferences for the foods associated with holidays. Even if what you make is better than the original they may still prefer the beloved tried-and-true.

No recipe as such, but if you want to make it cook cranberries with a little water until the skins pop.

Put the mixture through a sieve or food mill to remove tough skins and any seeds.

Return the puree to the pan and add sugar to taste. Cook to the jell point. You can process like jam or refrigerate.

Cranberries are naturally high in pectin, so additional pectin shouldn't be necessary, but if you want to use some, go ahead.

Carol

Thanks, Carol. I think if it is similar to what they are used to, they will enjoy it. I was just wondering if someone who has made it could tell me if it is like the canned kind, or is it a very different consistency. And, if not, what would adding pectin do to it.

Have the same issue in our family. We never should have let the kids taste it in the first place and they passed it on to the grandkids.

The typical canned cranberry sauce is so firm it can be slid whole out of the can and easily sliced into firm uniform slices that will retain their shape indefinitely. The home canned isn't nearly so firm. It has the consistency of jelly. You can stand a spoon up in it but it will slowly fall over and the slices aren't clean and firm. Not the same appearance or texture or mouth feel.

Sure you could add more pectin but it will only firm it up a little more and it does affect the flavor a bit due to the citrus in the pectin.

If your family is picky about their cranberry sauce I don't think they will like it as much and you'd have a lot of it to eat. I'd use the cranberries to make other things. Use them in baking muffins and cranberry bread instead or cranberry syrup for example.

Dave

Thanks, Dave. Just what I wanted to know and what I suspected. I guess I'll keep buying the cans, maybe make a small batch just to introduce it to them and use the rest as you suggested. I love banana cranberry bread and cranberry orange relish. The freezer is totally crammed after the summer harvest, so I think I'll look for a recipe to can the relish. Just when I thought I could put the canning supplies away, along comes another project.

Ocean Spray (and you don't get more traditional than that company) has a recipe online for homemade jellied cranberry sauce. So do a lot of other companies. That would give specific measurements. Take a look at the link.

If you felt inclined you could do a small refrigerated batch and offer it with the canned variety. A "taste test" might be kind of fun for Thanksgiving. And you may discover some family members, if not all, do prefer it.

Carol

Here is a link that might be useful: Homemade Jellied Cranberry Sauce

Thanks for the link, Carol. The pic sure makes it look like the canned version. Maybe the large amount of sugar will do that. Worth a try.

Yes, Carol was right about some family members will only eat what they're use to. We took a niece, her 12 year old daughter and her 2 year old son to Florida with us two years ago. They raised a stink about eating anything because it wasn't like what the niece's mother made. I was ready to crawl under the table at a restaurant when the niece ordered sweet tea than threw a loud, obnoxious fit because it was "too sweet, it's horrible". We went to some decent places to eat, but they picked apart everything they ordered and refused to eat it. I cringe at the thought of the money we spent. Try Carol's suggestion ahead of time for a sampling with your family then go on from there. If they don't like it as much as the canned version, you can always freeze the berries then use them for fruit breads and cookies.

I'm always trying something new at the holidays, just not everything. I'd try a small batch and also offer your traditional one. Which ever one comes up empty, wins.

We often went out to dinner with friends but finally gave up on that because the wife always found something to make a fuss about. It turned what should have been a pleasant occasion into a stressful and embarrassing one.

It was a little difficult because after the fifth or sixth time begging off they began to wonder what was up. But there's nothing like being with someone making a big stink to the poor waitress about a trivial issue. (This is a woman who loves deep fried macaroni and cheese so it's not as if she's a gourmet.)

Back to the subject - the British make what they call "fruit cheese" which is a jellied fruit puree you can slide out of a jar and slice. I have some recipes somewhere around here but it would take a bit of digging.

I tried looking online but kept running into cheeses with cranberry bits and that sort of thing and just didn't have time to do more intensive searching.

But when I get a minute I'll see if I can find something, either dig out a book or do an advanced search on UK sites.

There's also pate de fruit or fruit jellies, those jellied candies cut in squares and rolled in sugar. I've meant for some time to try that out, but they don't keep very well and if there's a lot of moisture in the air keeping them around is even more problematic.

Carol

"Fruit cheese" sounds like it would be worth a try. I'll search my old books that I inherited and see what I can find. Thanks, Carol, for the heads up.
My grandkids used to be fairly picky. But since we have expanded our gardening and canning adventures they have become more adventurous. Spending summer vacation with us and helping with the gardening and canning has made different foods more appealing. My grandson couldn't get enough of his first meal of homegrown tomato sauce. Ever since then he has been willing to try most things. But I have to admit I'm pretty hooked on the canned cranberry sauce myself.

I've made quince cheese (or paste) before, from Linda Z's Joy of Jams. I imagine you could make a fruit cheese from any fruit that has a fair amount of pectin (such as apples or cranberries). It just requires a LOT of cooking - more than a butter. It also turns out a bit more like a sweet b/c of all the sugar - I cut my paste into tiny shapes with cookie cutters.

I did find a recipe for Damson plum cheese or paste - the process is the same, though cranberries are so acidic I don't think you'd need lemon juice.

Here is a link that might be useful: Damson Plum Cheese

I was kinda LOL over this thread because I can SOO relate. While I'm envious of the original poster that she has so many cranberries to deal with, I also feel her pain with her families' preferences. I have found that as your family gets older, it just gets worse, LOL. They grow up with a certain thing and that is what they remember and want. We are also a canned jellied cranberry sauce people;) I'm not sure anything I could come up with would be an appropriate substitution. They want what they want when they come home. For myself, I would adore some cranberry jam-ish type stuff with a bisquit or piece of ham or turkey. But...who eats that type of stuff without family? :))

Make some cranberry jam (I like Cranberry Lime Jalapeno) - you only need 1 jar open all season if you're the only one eating it. My mom is another "canned cranberry sauce" fan - she's also the only one in the family who likes canned green beans. I don't know if I'll make fresh cranberry sauce/relish for Thanksgiving (I do have some above-mentioned jam), but I found the last package of frozen homegrown green beans when I was digging the other night, that has been put with the turkey on the top of the freezer, ready to go.

My grandmother made what we all call Cranberry Salad. It has a bag of cranberries, box of cherry Jell-O, box of strawberry Jell-O, sugar to get the cranberries macerating, celery in small dice, apple in small dice, orange in small dice (I include all the peeling as well), pecans, and marshmallows if you just have to have them.

Blitz the cranberries in a food processor, but not too fine. We used to use the old hand crank Universal grinder growing up. Add sugar to the cranberries and let the juices come out. Make the Jell-O and once you add the cold water, mix it with everything else and let the Jell-O congeal overnight. Serve cold the next day.

I'm sure there are measurements that could be applied, but I just do it now. Go easy on the sugar on the berries since everything else is sweet, but do use some to get them macerating. If you don't like something, don't use it. If you do like something, add more of it. I tried cranberry flavored Jell-O once and it just wasn't the same.

It makes great dessert with leftovers the next few days. We made it for the other wing of the family one year and the uncle went nuts over it. So we left the bowl with them and made more when we got home. :-)

I had the canned stuff growing up as well, but I despise it. I'll take a little bit to nibble on, but I won't take much.

Cranberries go great in quick breads and muffins as well. Look up orange cranberry bread, or cranberry orange bread. I'm sure there are tons.

I finally found the information about fruit cheeses in the old Time-Life Good Cook series, the Preserving volume. Actually they provide a damson plum cheese recipe, so perhaps the blogger ajsmama linked to was inspired by it.

Time-Life says that a fruit cheese is one step past a butter. It's cooked stiffer and has a higher proportion of sugar. They recommend warming the sugar in a 300 degree oven to reduce cooking time and pouring the preserve into a jar that's coated with a light tasteless oil to make removal easier.

It's stiff enough to be sliced and cut with an aspic or cookie cutter.

Carol

Sounds perfect, Carol. Can't wait to try it. Thanks again, everyone.

"My grandmother made what we all call Cranberry Salad."

We've always made this too! The difference being we use a whole orange, ground, skin and all. Let's see... halved grapes, ground apples, ground cranberries, celery,sugar, jello and pecan pieces stirred in when the jello is half set.

One year I tried substituting plain gelatin for the jello. That didn't fly. It's like the ubiquitous green bean casserole; when I tried a more contemporary version using fresh beans and substituting for the canned soup, I nearly had a rebellion on my hands.

Deborah

I forgot... crushed pineapple and sliced bananas are also added.

Deborah

My mother started all of us out on the canned, jellied cranberry sauce which I loved. Then she went to the chopped fresh cranberry salad with a whole orange and I don't know what else. I really never did like it. I still love the jellied sauce out of a can, but now my favorite is Kroger's cranberry salad which has the raspberry or cherry jello, walnuts and I don't know what else in it.

Cranberry sauce whether canned or homemade, is my very favorite "jam" for toast.

I used to make a cranberry/apple jelly. I'm sure you could make a 'jam' out of it.

With beautiful organic cranberries i would make my own if my family wanted the 'can'. I saw many recipes last week and here is one...linked
You can freeze your cranberries now for x-mas. No prep needed, just cook them straight from the freezer. No need to thaw (they will mush like most frozen berries/fruit).

Here is a link that might be useful: homemade can-shapped cranberry