Apple Cider Cranberry Sauce — 🍎😋❤️ Spice up your holiday celebrations with this scrumptious FAST and EASY homemade cranberry sauce that’s made with cranberries, apples, apple cider, cinnamon sticks, and allspice for the PERFECT must-make side dish! A lovely balance of sweet-yet-tart with warmly spiced flavors so you’ll never want to think about using store bought sauce again!
Table of Contents
This apple cider cranberry sauce has everything you love about traditional homemade cranberry sauce, but with the addition of cozy spiced apple flavor thanks to both apples and apple cider.
Thanksgiving and Christmas meals can be really stressful days for any home cook who’s trying to impress family and friends, but this cranberry apple cider sauce
is so easy to make and it’s ready in just 30 minutes!
If you’ve been using cranberry sauce from a can all this time, you’re going to have your mind blown at how the real deal is equal parts delicious and simple.
You’ve gotta love a super low maintenance side dish recipe because your focus should be on the turkey, not on the cranberry sauce!
Ingredients for Apple Cider Cranberry Sauce
You only need 8 simple and inexpensive ingredients to make homemade cranberry sauce with apples, so gather the following items:
- Fresh cranberries
- Apples
- Light brown sugar OR granulated sugar
- Apple cider (NOT apple cider vinegar!)
- Orange zest
- Orange juice
- Allspice
- Cinnamon sticks
Note: Scroll down to the recipe card section of the post for the ingredients with amounts included and for more complete directions.
How to Make Cranberry Sauce with Apple Cider
- Place all of your ingredients in a tall, high-sided pot and simmer them over medium-low to low heat.
- After about 10 minutes of cooking, when the cranberries have softened, you can use the back of a wooden spoon to press down on the berries. Or not.
Tip: If you like cranberry sauce with a bit more texture, just leave it alone for 20 to 30 minutes or until the apples and cranberries have both softened and the cranberries burst naturally.
- Remove the cinnamon sticks and either serve warm and fresh or chill it before serving if desired.
Looking for More Unique Cranberry Sauce Recipes?
You’ll also love my Cranberry Currant Sauce as well as this Red Wine Cranberry Blueberry Sauce, which has been a reader favorite for YEARS!
Recipe FAQs
Keep an eye on your cranberry sauce, checking in on it and giving it a stir every 5 minutes or so. Once the sauce has cooked for about 15 minutes and all of the berries have been popped, take a look at the consistency. Based on how thin or soupy it is, allow the apple cider cranberry sauce to simmer for about 10 minutes more, or until the liquid has simmered off and the sauce has thickened and tightened up.
Cranberry sauce will tighter and thicken up considerably as it cools at room temperature and then again after you chill it in the fridge.
Honeycrisp, Gala, Fuji, or Jonagold apples all work very well in this recipe if you like red apples. Red Delicious are too mushy so avoid those. I’d avoid using tart Granny Smith or green apples because they could lend too much vibrant sour flavor to the sauce.
It’s highly recommended that you make the cranberry sauce with apple cider, not apple juice. Apple cider is fresh, unfiltered, and usually doesn’t contain any added sugar. However, apple juice can be used in a pinch if it’s all that you have.
Frozen cranberries are fine to use, but they may not be quite as juicy as fresh ones. If you use frozen cranberries, you may need to supplement the lack of natural juices with a bit more orange juice or just don’t simmer the cranberry sauce quite as long.
While I have never personally canned cinnamon apple cranberry sauce before, you can most certainly try it yourself. There are plenty of resources on the internet when it comes to canning cranberry sauce. Make sure to follow the steps correctly to ensure it’s truly canned properly.
Yes! You can use either light brown sugar or white granulated sugar for this homemade cranberry sauce recipe. Brown sugar will give you a slightly more caramel-noted sauce whereas white sugar will be more along the lines of a traditional cranberry sauce, but with apples and apple cider, too.
Remember to remove the cinnamon sticks from the sauce before you serve it. If you’d like to add an extra pinch of ground cinnamon to the mix to enhance that warm fall flavor even more, go for it! Keep in mind that it’s already spiced from the allspice which contains cinnamon, so you may want to do a taste test before adding any more ground cinnamon.
What to Serve with Apple Cider Cranberry Sauce
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Cinnamon Apple Cider Cranberry Sauce
Ingredients
- 12 ounce bag fresh cranberries, frozen and thawed may be used
- 2 red apples, peeled, cored, and diced small (Gala, Fui, Honeycrisp, Jonagold, etc.)
- 1 cup light brown sugar, packed OR 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup apple cider*, NOT apple cider vinegar
- Zest from one medium to large orange
- ½ cup fresh orange juice, about the yield from one medium to large orange
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- ½ teaspoon allspice, or to taste
- Ground cinnamon, optional and to taste
Instructions
- To a large or high-sided pot, add all ingredients, making sure to zest the orange (only taking off the outermost layer of orange and not going down into the bitter white pith), and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.
- Once boiling, reduce the heat to medium-low or low, depending on if you're seeing an excessive amount of bubbling up and splattering. Allow the sauce to simmer for about 20 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes or so to prevent it from sticking to the bottom. Tips – Some people like to mash or mush the cranberries while they simmer however this reduces the nice texture of homemade cranberry sauce and makes it smoother. Plus, cranberries are going to burst with or without mashing them when they're boiling so I just leave it alone to simmer and do it's thing naturally.
- Simmer as long as necessary so it's not too thin or soupy noting that it will tighten and thicken up considerably once you take it off the heat and it cools to room temperature, and then again once it's chilled in the fridge it will thicken even more.
- Remove the cinnamon sticks, and optionally if desired, add ground cinnamon to taste (1/2 to 1 teaspoon approximately) and stir to combine.
- Cranberry sauce can be served warm and fresh, or chill it in the fridge before serving. Cranberry sauce will keep airtight in the fridge for up to 1 week or in the freezer for up to 3 months. To make ahead, feel free to make a batch and store it in the fridge for up to 2-3 days before serving it at a holiday meal.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Recipes to Make Using Leftover Cranberry Sauce:
Cranberry Baked Brie — An EASY 15-minute appetizer that’s filled AND topped with richly spiced orange-scented cranberry sauce. Perfect for holiday entertaining! This baked cranberry brie is salty, tart-yet-sweet, and IRRESISTIBLE!
Cranberry Brie Bites — ❤️🤤 The perfect two-bite holiday appetizer recipe with melted brie cheese, sweet-tart cranberry sauce, and fresh rosemary all nestled inside a buttery soft crust!
Hawaiian Roll Turkey and Cheese Sliders — Juicy turkey, Swiss cheese, and cranberry sauce all nestled in soft Hawaiian rolls that are brushed with butter and topped with poppy seeds for the BEST turkey sliders!
Baked Brie in Puff Pastry — Warm melted cheese, layered with cranberry sauce, and baked in flaky puff pastry is a crowd FAVORITE appetizer! Fast and EASY for you, IRRESISTIBLE for everyone else!
Layered Christmas Jello Salad — A festive layered Jello dessert with cranberries, pineapple, cream cheese, pecans, and pretzels! A little bit creamy, crunchy, sweet, and a little salty.
Made this last year for Thanksgiving and looking forward to making it this year. Would love to can it and give out to friends and family. Any information from anyone on how well this stays when canned?
Thanks for the 5 star review, Katherine, and I am glad it was a winner and you look forward to making it again!
As I say in https://www.averiecooks.com/cabernet-cranberry-and-blueberry-sauce/ in the FAQs (because people ask me all the time about canning on that recipe!) I really am not a canning expert and cannot give any guidance. In theory, when one cans something, it’s safe to eat for a good long time. Months if not years. However, it must be done correctly and don’t know how to advise you on that. I would Google and search for ways to can cranberry sauce.