With Thanksgiving behind us and a handful of holidays yet to come this year, it seemed like a good time to discuss one of the oft-maligned yet very common sides found on many holiday tables: cranberries. Now I know that some of you are on team cran, but I know many of you are not.
When I say cranberry sauce, many of you can hear the distinctive slurp sound it makes sliding out of the can and onto the dish, before being sliced into rounds of gelatinous red hockey pucks that retain the ridge lines from their time jiggling in that can.
So, let’s begin with the gorgeous red of cranberries, which mirrored my 1980s prom dress (by the way). One of only three native fruits to North America, the humble cranberry was used by the First Nations and Native Americans along eastern U.S. and Canada, including New England, New Brunswick and Ontario, for thousands of years. They frequently mixed the berries with deer meat to create pemmican. Some of you may remember eating a version of that many years ago as a nutrient-dense block when backpacking. (I was never a fan, but to each their own.)
I slipped in there that the cranberry is one of only three native fruits. Do you know what the other two are? Blueberries and a wide variety of grapes. Unlike grapes and blueberries, the cranberry is unique in several ways. One is that the process of growing and harvesting has been traditionally done in marshes or bogs. They do love acidic soil like blueberries, but in late December, the fields are flooded, helping the vines to go dormant and protecting them from the brutal winds of the Northeast.
That flooding process also enables harvesting ease in the fall. If you have ever driven through parts of Maine or Massachusetts in October, you may have passed the bright red ‘lakes’ of cranberries getting ready to harvest. Farmers, being among some of the most industrious humans I know, have spread that fruit to other parts of the country, and they are thriving everywhere from New Jersey to Wisconsin to Washington State. The main thing all these locations have in common is their natural or human-made marshes/bogs and acidic soil.
What you might have noticed is I didn’t mention our beautiful Colorado or anywhere in the Southwest for that matter. Primarily because we are just so darn alkaline with our pesky lack of precipitation and much drier soils. Not to mention a very distinct lack of bogs or marshes.
I should also mention that cranberries are extremely beneficial for our health. What kind of mother would I be if I didn’t tell you that they are loaded with vitamin C, fiber and antioxidants? Those antioxidants are rich in phenols – the same compound found in red wine – which many articles suggest can help combat diseases. They are also low in sugar, which gives them their intense tartness. If you have ever dared to eat one raw, it is one heck of a pucker inducer.
Personally, it is one of my all-time favorite side dishes to prepare. I only buy organic cranberries because commercial crops use a lot of herbicides and pesticides in cranberry production, but if you wash them in vinegar or baking soda, that cleans off the residue. Usually, I buy four or five bags at a time. Boil them in orange juice, not from concentrate, and mix in some other fun fruit, like strawberries, raspberries, apples, or my choice this year, crushed pineapple. I also use a small mountain of cinnamon, plus agave syrup and brown sugar to taste. Then I let that boil down to a thick mess.
Eat them warm or cold, but they are amazing just as they are, or with cottage cheese or vanilla ice cream. Heck, one of my co-workers just told me about cran-a-ritas, where the juice is strained out and mixed with your favorite cocktail. Really, if it doesn’t come slurping out of a can, I pretty much think they are as close to perfection as we can get on our plates. Happy Holidays and bon appetit!
Heather Houk is the Horticulture and Agriculture specialist for the La Plata County Extension Office.
