I ran out to pick up some frozen cranberries and found, to my dismay, that they don’t actually exist. Mr. Walmart and I did try to find them, but no luck in frozen foods. Then, while wandering around in the produce section, I serendipitously discovered the little red devils sitting innocently enough, right next to the packaged salads. I grabbed four bags, and ran. Well actually, I paid for them and then ran…home…in my car.
I did just what the recipe said and it was a pretty fun adventure. And now, I can honestly say that my sauce tastes better than theirs. The back of the cranberry bag said you can store them in the freezer just the way they are. So, I saved the other three bags for a great winter tonic that we’ll talk about soon.
The Elusive Sieve
The previous post mentions a sieve, so, while at the market, I went to the homey gadgets section and found a colander, a strainer, a sifter, a steamer…but nothing that said the word, “sieve.” So I chose a large mesh wire strainer and crossed my fingers. Turns out–sieve and strainer are about the same thing.
Cranberries have teeny, tiny seeds…about a billion of them, and so what you want is a wire strainer with small mesh. The new one was too big and let all the seeds through. So I re-poured the hot jelly through a smaller one–that I discovered in a drawer. Then, I found an old pointy, metal strainer of my mom’s that would have worked too. Yeah…I’m a noob.
So, now we have three. But don’t you worry. I’ll be totally prepared if another seed extraction project comes along…
ahhh…when..
I mean when…
You’ve got to love the random things you can just FIND in our drawers. 😉
Oh… and way to go! Who would’ve thought… Homemade cranberry sauce! Now I want to get some croissants sooo I can have a tasty little sandwich on Friday with the leftover turkey! 😉
I sure hope your homemade cranberry sauce was worth all that effort. Phew! I’m not sure I would have had the patience to go through all the fun you seemed to have had.
I made it again this year with my cute little strainer and it was wonderful. It tastes so good to use the fresh stuff.
How are you?