Since this is our first Thanksgiving in our house (and as a married couple) we’re celebrating the actual day of Thanksgiving at home. I’m still not sure what we’re having, but I got in a cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie mood this past week, so I bought the ingredients and planned to make them this past weekend. While I was at Target I also spotted Gardein stuffed Turky, and picked up a bag to go along with our faux Thanksgiving meal.

I made sweet potato fries, corn (just heated up frozen), Gardein stuffed turky w/gravy, and cranberry sauce. I got a silicone heart mold and made mint chocolate chip brownies for Saturday night, and made a pumpkin pie on Saturday to eat on Sunday. (And we had pumpkin spice waffles, and blueberry muffins with walnut pecan topping…I swear I never bake this much.)

I wanted to share the cranberry sauce recipe, since it’s so simple and it’s so much better than that gelatinous stuff that comes in a can.

I’ve read recipes that use orange juice, sugar, cornstarch/arrowroot, etc, but this time I stuck with cranberries, pineapple juice (from a can of pineapple), and agave. I used 1/4 cup of agave and it was still pretty tart, but that’s how I like it. You can adjust the sweetness to your liking, but cranberries themselves aren’t sweet, so it’s easy to go overboard with the sugar.

Yields about 3 servings

• 7.5 oz cranberries
• 1 cup pineapple juice (or juice from an orange)
• ~1/4 cup of agave or other liquid sweetener

In a sauce pan, heat the juice and agave until almost boiling.

Add the cranberries and simmer on low for 10-20 minutes, until gooey.

Remove from heat and let stand for another 10 minutes to allow to thicken and cool.