Instant Pot Cranberry Sauce Without Orange Juice

Instant pot cranberry sauce without orange juice using just 3 main ingredients is so simple, quick and easy to prepare, delicious and makes the perfect condiment for Thanksgiving dinner or Christmas holidays. You can also prepare easy cranberry sauce on stove top (recipe here) but if you have instant pot, preparing cranberry sauce is way more easier than preparing it on the stove top! The taste of cranberry sauce is tart and sweet and it goes great as a sidie dish especially if you love the sour, tangy and bittersweet taste of cranberries!

You can just dump the ingredients (only 3 main ingredients used in this recipe which includes a little water and also an optional ingredient of apple juice for more flavor and taste) to the instant pot, cook it and its done!

No need to stand over the stove and wait until the sauce is done which reduces the work so much.

As I mentioned, we only use 3 main ingredients other than apple juice in this easy instant pot cranberry sauce recipe, which includes the cranberries, sugar and water.

I didn’t use orange juice or anything else other than apple juice for flavor and this was delicious!

Sauces, fruit jams and condiments are super easy to make in the instant pot and this easy instant pot applesauce no sugar recipe is another easy sauce recipe I tried in the instant pot.

I have also made instant pot mango jam, instant pot peach jam, instant pot plum jam, instant pot strawberry honey jam and instant pot blueberry jam which were all so easy to make.

I have made fruit butters too in the instant pot, like this instant pot spiced peach butter, instant pot strawberry apple butter etc and they all turned out so delicious and very easy to make!

So here is how you can make this easy instant pot cranberry sauce.

How To Make Instant Pot Cranberry Sauce Without Orange Juice?

We need the following ingredients to make the cranberry sauce in the instant pot.

Ingredients to make cranberry sauce in instant pot

1.5 cups cranberries (12 oz)

1 cup sugar may use more if needed

¼ cup water

apple juice 2 tablespoons (optional, adjust to taste)

Steps To Follow (The Process)

Transfer the cranberries (washed very well) to the instant pot.

Add the sugar and water, mix everything until well combined.

Close the instant pot with lid in sealing position and cook for four minutes in high pressure.

Once the cooking is done, wait for a natural pressure release.

Once the pressure is all released, carefully and slowly open the lid and stir the content.

Add more sugar if needed (maybe taste and decide, be careful as the contents will be very hot at this time).

Also you may simmer the contents for about a minute for the desired consistency.

Remember that the cranberry sauce thickens as it cools down so you shouldn’t simmer for more time.

Finally, stir in the apple juice (if using) which will help greatly with balancing the tart taste of cranberry sauce!

How To Store Cranberry Sauce?

Once the cranberry sauce is prepared in the instant pot, transfer the homemade cranberry sauce to clean, dry and airtight glass jars and store in the refrigerator which can last for about 2 weeks of time or you may freeze this for few more days use.

Can You Use Frozen Cranberries To Make The Instant Pot Cranberry Sauce?

Yes, you can use frozen cranberries.

I used fresh cranberries to make this instant pot cranberry sauce, but if the cranberries that you have is frozen, you can use them.

The only difference will be that since they are frozen, the instant pot will probably take more time to come to pressure, everything else will probably remain the same I think.

Also, if you are using frozen cranberries, I do not recommend storing the sauce for more than couple of days (even when refrigerated) to make sure it stays fresh.

Is This Cranberry Sauce Vegan?

Yes, this cranberry sauce is vegan since we only use vegan ingredients. So if you are on a vegan diet also, you can enjoy this cranberry sauce.

Also this cranberry sauce makes an easy, delicious condiment in any vegetarian or vegan Thanksgiving dinner menu.

Tips To Make The Best Instant Pot Cranberry Sauce

Always make sure to use good quality cranberries to prepare the cranberry sauce.

Sometimes the package of cranberries that we buy from the stores may have a few cranberries that are not so good, so make sure to check and discard the ones which are about to go bad.

Only use the good quality cranberries to make the sauce.

The sweetness of the cranberries will depend on the amount of sugar that you add and also the tartness of the cranberries that you use.

So in this recipe, we have used just 1 cup of sugar, but depending on how tart the cranberries are, you may need to add more sugar to balance the sweetness.

You can taste the sauce and add more sugar if needed, towards the end of the preparation.

As you can see, we only used 3 main ingredients in this instant pot cranberry sauce.

The main ingredients that we used are cranberries, sugar and water but we also use apple juice as an optional ingredient at the end of preparation, which greatly help with balancing the tart flavor.

We made this instant pot cranberry sauce without orange juice (which is a popular ingredient in cranberry sauce recipes) but if you wish to add orange juice to it, you may replace the ¼ cup of water with fresh orange juice, though I haven’t tried this myself so I can’t say how the flavors will be.

Instead of orange juice, you may also use lemon juice but I think that would make the cranberry sauce too tart so you may need more sugar to balance the sweetness.

Also you may try adding flavors like vanilla essence if you wish.

What Does Cranberry Sauce Taste Like?

Cranberries are delicious fruits which are usually very sour or tart in flavor.

They do have a bitter taste too in them so when you make homemade cranberry sauce, it is possible that the cranberry sauce may taste slightly bitter and tart in flavor in addition to the sweetness owing to the sugar that we add.

Canned cranberry sauces that we get in market are usually very sweet because of the sugar, but when we make the fresh cranberry sauce at home using fresh or frozen cranberries, the tartness and slight bitterness of the cranberries may be retained irrespective of the sugar or sweetener that we use to make the cranberry sauce.

However the bitterness will depend on the cranberries that we use to make the sauce, so we cannot really say how tart or bitter flavor the sauce will retain despite the amount of sugar that we use in the recipe.

In brief, the homemade cranberry sauce has very strong flavors and will be sweet and tart and slightly bitter too depending on the cranberries used.

We also use apple juice which will help balance the taste of cranberry sauce, so make sure to add the apple juice (even though this is optional) if you are concerned about the taste of cranberry sauce without orange juice!

If your homemade cranberry sauce has too  bitter aftertaste, then you might add more powdered sugar or honey or maple syrup just before serving.

If you add powered sugar, stir well to combine with the sauce so the sugar will dissolve and blend well with the sauce.

If you use granulated sugar, it will be difficult to dissolve the sugar unless you heat the sauce again, so I recommend using powdered sugar to adjust the sweetness once the sauce is ready and if you want to add more sweetness.

If you love fresh cranberries (they have so many health benefits as well), you may enjoy a few raw or cooked as well, blended with spices for flavor.

Also, the addition of apple juice in this recipe will make it taste much better and in fact great, as it helps great with balancing the natural sour or tart flavor of cranberries.

Instead of sugar, you can enjoy cranberries spicy or with other mild flavors. See here how to eat cranberries without sugar for more ideas to enjoy cranberries.

Easy Cranberry Recipes For Holidays:

Cranberry Ice Cream Recipe Without Ice Cream Maker

Cranberry Sauce Stove Top Recipe

Cornbread Muffins With Cranberry Sauce Topping

leftover cranberry sauce muffins

cranberry juice cocktail in instant pot

moist cranberry banana bread eggless

You can see the instant pot cranberry sauce recipe in detail below.