Looking to add a healthy twist to your Thanksgiving table this year? These two recipes bring festive flavors and nourishing benefits to your holiday table with the added power of essential oils!
First, try Fermented Cranberry Sauce, a tangy, probiotic-rich take on a classic holiday favorite that’s as good for your gut and bursting with flavor.
Then, sip on Spiced Apple Cider with Collagen, infused with warming essential oils for a comforting drink that also supports radiant skin and joint health.
These recipes are simple, delicious, and enhanced with the natural benefits of essential oils—making them a perfect way to celebrate wellness and gratitude. Let’s create a Thanksgiving that’s as healthful as it is flavorful! 🧡
Fermented Cranberry Sauce
Watch the step-by-step recipe video at MarysNest.com/how-to-make-fermented-cranberry-sauce/
Prep Time: 10 minutes Fermentation Time: 4 days
Makes 12 servings
- 3 cups raw cranberries
- 1/4 cup whey, strained from plain yogurt or plain kefir
- 1/2 tablespoon coarse ground sea salt or 1/4 tablespoon fine ground sea salt
- Filtered water, preferably chlorine-free
- 1/3 cup pourable honey (preferably raw) or maple syrup
Equipment
- 1 quart-sized jar with a lid
- 1 four-ounce jar or glass fermentation weight
- Mesh strainer
- 2 medium or large bowls
To ferment cranberries properly and use them to make cranberry sauce, you will want to roughly chop them with a knife or smash them in a large bowl using a kraut pounder, wooden spoon, or spatula. (Cook’s Note: Do not chop the cranberries in a blender. They will be chopped too finely and will ferment too quickly, creating alcohol. You may use a food processor, but if you do this, you will need to be very careful. You will need no more than a few pulses to sufficiently chop the cranberries.)
Once the cranberries are chopped, add them to the quart-sized jar. Add the salt and the whey to the jar. Add the water to the jar until the cranberries are completely submerged.
Weigh down the cranberries in the jar with a second small jar or a glass fermentation weight.
Put a cap on the jar and place the jar in an undisturbed place out of direct sunlight where the temperature is approximately between 68 and 72 degrees F. (As a safeguard, I highly recommend placing the jar into a bowl to catch any fermentation brine that might bubble out of the jar, even with the lid on.)
Each day, release the cap on the jar to remove any buildup of carbon dioxide. If you use special equipment, such as a “pickle pipe” or another fermentation device, you do not need to do this step.
After a few days, you should start to notice a few bubbles accumulating in your jar. The bubbles indicate the fermentation process is moving in the right direction. The secret is to “catch” your fermentation when it is in the bubbling stage before it moves on to turn into alcohol. (This stage of fermentation usually occurs within 3 to 4 days.)
Within 3 to 4 days, you should see a lot of bubbles, and this indicates that your fermented cranberries are ready. Now is the time to move on to the next step.
Using a mesh strainer, strain your cranberries over a bowl to catch the cranberry brine. DO NOT throw this brine out.
Transfer the cranberries to a bowl and add a whole sweetener to your taste. I recommend between 1/4 cup to 1/3 cup honey. You’ve now created fermented cranberry sauce!
Decant the fermented cranberry sauce into a jar and top it off with some of the brine so that all the cranberry sauce is submerged under the brine. Refrigerate the cranberry sauce. It will stay fresh, refrigerated, for about 2 to 3 weeks, after which time it will begin to turn into alcohol and then vinegar.
Recipe Notes
Keep in mind that fruit ferments very quickly. Even after you refrigerate your fermented cranberry sauce, it will continue to ferment, just at a much slower rate than it would at room temperature. However, even at this slowed fermentation rate, fermented cranberry sauce (or any fermented fruit) will begin to turn into alcohol and then eventually into vinegar. So be sure to consume all your fermented fruit within the first few weeks of making it.
If you added honey to your fermented cranberry sauce, remember to never feed honey of any kind to babies/infants younger than 1 year old.
If you are using the brine to create a probiotic-rich beverage, you can sweeten it with a Healthy Simple Syrup.
Healthy Simple Syrup
This healthy sweetener is perfect for sweetening beverages, cold and flu tonics, and more. Infuse it with herbs and spices to boost its health-giving properties.
Prep Time: 5 minutes Steeping Time: 1 day
- 1 cup warm water, no warmer than 110 degrees F
- 1 cup pourable honey, preferably raw, or maple syrup
- 1/4 cup fresh ginger, grated, and/or fresh turmeric, grated, optional
- 1/4 cup fresh mint or other herbs, optional
- 1/8 teaspoon whole dried spices such as cinnamon sticks, cloves, star anise, etc., optional
- 1 lemon or other citrus fruit, zest only, optional
Equipment
- A vessel large enough to hold at least two cups of liquid
Add warm water to a bowl or large measuring cup.
Pour honey into the water and stir well until completely dissolved.
Add additional infusions to honey or maple syrup and water. For your infusions, you may use individual amounts, such as 1/4 cup of grated ginger or any combination of herbs, spices, or zest. Stir well.
Cover the honey or maple syrup and water mixture and refrigerate for 24 hours.
After 24 hours, strain out the infusions, decant the syrup into a bottle or jar with a lid, and refrigerate. When refrigerated, this syrup will stay fresh for 1 month.
Spiced Apple Cider Latte
There's no better way to embrace the cozy autumn vibes than with a delicious, easy-to-make drink that's packed with natural goodness! You will love this spiced cider recipe that boasts incredible flavors and a boost for your skin thanks to some of my favorite vitality oils and YL’s Inner Beauty Collagen!
Interested in the essential oils and the Inner Beauty Collagen? Please reach out to me!
You can also click on this link for Spiced Apple Cider with Collagen
If you decide to order and this is your first, then use the discount code SHAREYL
ENJOY!!
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