Thanksgiving! (Part One)

Thanksgiving is my very, very, very, very favorite holiday. The smell of turkey stuffed with savory goodness, the crunch of the leaves, the multi-colored squashes, the taste of the pumpkin pie. So, imagine my surprise a few years back when all of a sudden bread and sugar  and root vegetables were off the menu. What!?!?!?! No bread stuffing? No mashed potatoes? No creamed onions? No cranberry sauce? No pie? No pie!??!?!?!?  How the heck can you celebrate Thanksgiving without pie? Visions of Snoopy in a chef's hat serving popcorn came rushing toward me. Even Snoopy got to have toast. Uggh. Luckily, I had a few months to prepare for a pie-less Thanksgiving, and here is one of the things I learned to make....... And it's good.

Thanksgiving Recipe No. 1 (more to come....)
Cranberry Sauce with Lime and Ginger

When I first started making this 20 years ago, it called for maple syrup AND sugar--both very high-glycemic ingredients.  Honey, on the other hand, has natural antibiotic and antifungal qualities, which is the reason that the honey that archeologists have found in sealed jars in Egyptian tombs is still okay to eat, 2500 years later. This cuts the amount of sugar in the final product by more than half, and adds a little kick to your holiday..  If you can hit all of your tastebuds in one meal, you will find yourself supremely satisfied before you take that third helping of turkey.

1/2 cup of water
1/2 cup of honey
pinch of salt
1 bag of fresh or frozen cranberries. (These bags get smaller by the day--what are they, 10 oz. now?)
1 thumb sized piece of ginger, minced finely (If you don't have fresh ginger, you can use 1/2 teaspoon of powdered ginger
zest of 1 lime
juice of 1 lime (the same lime, silly)

Bring the water and honey to a low boil in a medium sized sauce pan.  Add the salt , the ginger, and the cranberries and return to a low boil.  Reduce the heat to low and cover. Cook for about 10 minutes, until most of the cranberries have heated through enough to pop.  You can give them a little help by poking at them with a wooden spoon.  Add the juice and zest of the lime and stir them in.  Remove from the heat and let sit.  The sauce will thicken slightly as it cools. You can serve this warm, room temp or cold.  And it is not just for Thanksgiving. It makes a great side with Roast Beef and Horseradish Sour Cream (I'll save that recipe for another day). Or on lean pork loin.  Also adds a nice bite to grilled chicken breast. 

Yum.