Traditions define Thanksgiving. But no one wants to talk about the ones that make you question your family loyalty. Take my mom’s cranberry sauce. You don’t need an invitation to her house to know what it tastes like—the recipe is printed on the back of every bag of cranberries. It’s sweet, sticky, and completely uninteresting. I loathe the stuff.
So when it came time for me to host my inaugural Thanksgiving dinner 15 years ago, you can probably guess the first thing I put my stamp on. The November 2002 issue of Bon Appétit had a few cranberry-sauce recipes, but one caught my attention, not because it had orange or mint or ginger but because it was uncooked. Yes, raw! Since then, it’s been the one constant on my Thanksgiving table. It’s got zip and acidity and tames all those big flavors.
The original recipe has changed over time—less sugar in 2006, more varieties of citrus in 2012. For 2017, senior food editor Claire Saffitz put her spin on it with the addition of dried currants and walnuts. But one thing will never change. Sorry, Mom, I’m not cooking my cranberries.
