Kitchen Efficency or How to get multiple uses from one cooking event
December 24, 2007
It is no secret to you that I am naturally lazy. I will do work that is required, but I do not love it and I want to make the most of it when I do it. So, faced with more Holiday entertaining this weekend, I made another ham and since the Blue/Cranberry Sauce was so good last time, I thought I’d whip it up again, too. I put the ham in the slow cooker (on low) with a bottle of hard cider and a cup of the berry sauce. I went to work and my mother-in-law stayed home and had a quiet day. She basted the ham a few times over it’s four hour cooking, but I think it would have been fine even if it had been ignored. The left-over ham is destined for a meat and cheese tray on Christmas Day. The left-over sauce is for cocktails! (see below for two ideas)
Aura’s Blue Cranberry Sauce, Version 2
2 pounds berries (1 pound each frozen blueberries and cranberries)
2 12 ounce bottles of hard cider
2 cups sugar
2 big, hard squeezes of the teddy bear honey bottle
Simmer for an hour, smashing any berries that don’t pop open on their own. Strain (cheese cloth would have been far more effective that the mesh strainer). Return to pan and reduce if desired. I got a quart of sauce after straining and I used one cup in the ham, reduced two cups for glaze at the table and kept the rest in the liquid state for cocktails.
Blue Cranberry Champagne
Place about a tablespoon of sauce in bottom of flute, pour in champagne to fill
