With Thanksgiving (in America!) getting ever closer, it’s time to start thinking about Thanksgiving menus! As a New England girl, I kind of feel it’s my duty to include cranberries in as many Thanksgiving-themed items as possible. To accomplish this, I’ve made a delicious low carb cranberry sauce, that’s made without extra sugar and is keto-friendly. How does one do this? Magic! And wine!
But seriously, on both accounts… The recipe was painfully easy to make, and barely required anything more than a bag of cranberries, some stevia and some red wine. I really wasn’t kidding about the wine. I know you may be wondering how it’s possible to have made a low carb cranberry sauce that is actually acceptable to those of us trying to keep keto, but I assure you – it’s possible.

This low carb cranberry sauce is thick and spreadable, more like a relish, and less like the wiggly, overly-sugared canned stuff.
Recipe notes for Low Carb Cranberry Sauce:
- The 1/4 cup of red wine used in this recipe, could easily be replaced by white wine…or lime juice, or lemon juice. You’re pretty much looking to add a little acid. I imagine that even 1 tbsp of apple cider vinegar in 3 tbsp water would do the trick.
- You could easily jazz this up with 1 tbsp of orange/lemon/lime zest OR 1 tsp cinnamon. Heck cinnamon AND orange zest would also make for a delightful cranberry sauce.
- Stevia is kind of a fickle mistress, since different brands bring with them varying levels of sweetness – I’d recommend starting small (15-20 drops for the whole batch), thoroughly mixing it in, and then adjusting from there. I usually use this site for conversions, but find that brands vary so much, it can be tricky.
- This makes a killer topping for mashed squash. Just throwing that out there.
Ingredients
- 1 bag (12 oz) fresh cranberries
- 1/4 cup red wine
- liquid stevia (to taste - see note above)
Method
- Pour wine and cranberries into a saucepan on medium low heat.
- Cover the pan and let sit for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. The cranberries should be "popped" open by now. Gently press down with a spoon to open up the remaining cranberries.
- Remove the lid, and continue cooking - stirring frequently - until the sauce is thick (this was about 20 minutes for me).
- Remove from heat, and add stevia to taste (see note above).
- Stir, and you're done!