Autumn has a lot going for it in my opinion: lack of sweating, ensconcing oneself in blankets, and several months of wearing sweaters are all top flight reasons to give this season top billing, but it also contains my absolute favorite holiday: Thanksgiving.
While Thanksgiving has given us some rather iffy and overly literal attempts at translating the delightful flavors of the season into the beverage world(I'm looking at you Turkey and stuffing sodas!), there are other flavors of the fall season that are clearly much better suited to enchant the masses with slightly less on the nose elements that are still quite identifiable to this time of the year.
While the usual autumnal suspects such as apple, pumpkin, sweet potato, and pear are living it up in an assortment of pies and tarts, the steadfast cranberry only sees a limited amount of action, and as a side dish no less.
Essentially, they have been the Rodney Dangerfield of the season's bounty, only recently gaining a moderately larger amount of respect by getting to dress up more like a sexy artisan relish as opposed to hitting the table after being thoughtlessly dumped in a frumpy bowl, still wearing the shape of the aluminum can from whence it came. As I say, no respect.
Cranberries deserve better, dammit. They are imbued with rich color, a pleasing, yet acerbic tartness, and a ever so slightly vegetal depth that reminds you that they are not the factory farmed wallflowers or the artificially enhanced losers everyone assumes that them to be.
With such delightful qualities, they are perfect for shrub, especially at this time of the year when the cranberry harvest is in full swing and staggeringly fresh offerings can be had from the right regions. In most cases, you can make pretty decent shrub even if the fruit is not organic or local, but please let me point out to you that when making cranberry shrub that this is a very distinct exception.
Using cranberry and white wine vinegar as the base, I have made two different shrubs, one with brown sugar and mulling spices, and the other simply with white sugar.
Let's compare the two:
Ambrose
Named for early American author Ambrose Bierce aka "Bitter Bierce," this is a fairly stripped down shrub made with white wine vinegar, white sugar, and fresh cranberries.
Ingredients:
16 oz cranberries, pulsed
13 oz white sugar
13 oz white wine vinegar
Equipment:
Colander
Food scale
Food Processor or blender
Food Processor or blender
Sealable non-reactive container
Strainers of increasing fineness
Large measuring cup
Tea strainer
Funnel(preferably canning funnel)
Sealable glass bottle
Wash cranberries and pat dry.
Remove container from refrigerator and unseal. Place on scale, once again using tare function.
Add white wine vinegar to container. Reseal, and place back into refrigerator. Rest jar one week.
After one week, remove container from refrigerator. Arrange strainers in levels of increasing fineness over measuring cup. Strain liquid through strainers, pressing on pulp to express any trapped shrub.
Place funnel in bottle, and situate tea strainer in funnel opening.
Pour strained shrub through tea strainer into bottle, and seal bottle.
Refrigerated shrub should last from six months to one year.
Enjoy.
Wash cranberries and pat dry.
Put blender carafe or separate bowl on the scale and use the tare function. In your blender carafe or a separate bowl, weigh cranberries on scale and use tare function to zero out
the reading. Add sugar until you reach desired weight of sugar into container until desired
weight is reached. Use tare function again.
In blender or food processor, blend sugar and cranberries until a thick, syrupy
mixture forms. Pour mixture into non-reactive container and rest mixture in refrigerator for 2-5
hours.
Remove container from refrigerator and unseal. Place on scale, once again using tare function.
Add white wine vinegar to container. Reseal, and place back into refrigerator. Rest jar one week.
After one week, remove container from refrigerator. Arrange strainers in levels of increasing fineness over measuring cup. Strain liquid through strainers, pressing on pulp to express any trapped shrub.
Place funnel in bottle, and situate tea strainer in funnel opening.
Pour strained shrub through tea strainer into bottle, and seal bottle.
Refrigerated shrub should last from six months to one year.
Enjoy.
The use of white sugar lends a more neutral sweetness that balances both the natural tartness of the cranberry as well as the acidic bite of the vinegar without too much outside coloration of the flavor. If you would like your cranberry shrub mildly tart, while offering the most undiluted, pure cranberry flavor, Ambrose is your man.
Fox In The Snow
As previously stated, Fox In The Snow shares much of its DNA with its sibling, but swaps in the slightly earthy, more molasses-y brown sugar for white, and adds mulling spices.
Ingredients:
16 oz cranberries, pulsed
12 oz white sugar
13 oz white wine vinegar
1 tsp ground mulling spices
Equipment:
Colander
Food scale
Food Processor or blender
Food Processor or blender
Sealable non-reactive container
Strainers of increasing fineness
Large measuring cup
Tea strainer
Funnel(preferably canning funnel)
Sealable glass bottle
Wash cranberries and pat dry.
In blender or food processor, blend sugar and cranberries until a thick, syrupy mixture forms. Pour mixture into non-reactive container and rest mixture in refrigerator for 2-5 hours.
Remove container from refrigerator and unseal. Place on scale, once again using tare function. Add white wine vinegar to container. Reseal, and place back into refrigerator. Rest jar one week.
After one week, remove container from refrigerator. Arrange strainers in levels of increasing fineness over measuring cup. Strain liquid through strainers, pressing on pulp to express any trapped shrub.
Place funnel in bottle, and situate tea strainer in funnel opening.
Pour strained shrub through tea strainer into bottle, and seal bottle.
Refrigerated shrub should last from six months to one year.
Enjoy.
Wash cranberries and pat dry.
Put blender carafe or separate bowl on the scale and use the tare function. In your blender carafe or a separate bowl, weigh cranberries on scale and use tare function to zero out
the reading.
Add sugar until you reach desired weight of sugar into container until desired weight is reached. Use tare function again.
Add sugar until you reach desired weight of sugar into container until desired weight is reached. Use tare function again.
In blender or food processor, blend sugar and cranberries until a thick, syrupy mixture forms. Pour mixture into non-reactive container and rest mixture in refrigerator for 2-5 hours.
Remove container from refrigerator and unseal. Place on scale, once again using tare function. Add white wine vinegar to container. Reseal, and place back into refrigerator. Rest jar one week.
After one week, remove container from refrigerator. Arrange strainers in levels of increasing fineness over measuring cup. Strain liquid through strainers, pressing on pulp to express any trapped shrub.
Place funnel in bottle, and situate tea strainer in funnel opening.
Pour strained shrub through tea strainer into bottle, and seal bottle.
Refrigerated shrub should last from six months to one year.
Enjoy.
While FITS files off some of the sharper edges of the cranberries, the overall profile has a rounder profile that somehow draws more of the inherent berry flavor out of cranberry and has the mulling spices add some complementary depth and brightness that make this one a bit more prone to leisurely drinking away from the dinner table as it lacks the palette razing aperitif qualities of the Ambrose. Comforting and warm, like the Belle and Sebastian song that is its namesake, it stands in stark contrast to its companion shrub.
In either case, I believe that despite having such markedly different personalities, both of these shrubs do an excellent job of harnessing one of my favorite fruits of the season, finally giving it a seat at the grown up table.
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