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    Home » Recipes » Wine & Beer Brewing

    Cranberry Wine

    Published: Sep 30, 2020

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    Cranberries make a fantastic red wine. The hardest part about making homemade cranberry wine is waiting - but it's definitely worth it!

    A glass of cranberry wine is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    Cranberry is one of the very first wines we tackled, way back when we started making wine about a decade ago.

    If I recall correctly, it was September or October when we started - our first attempt at brewing was our Homemade Hard Apple Cider - and we were putting a batch of Cranberry Wine on in late October or Early November, when cranberries went on sale for the holidays.

    See, when you are like us, and take on home brewing, grocery trips change. “Can we make wine from that?” is a frequent question we would ask each other, and a lot of the time.. Yes, we would ferment it.

    ... and when cranberries would go on sale dirt cheap, of COURSE we made wine from it!

    Not only are cranberries cheap and- at certain times of the year - very easy to come by, they make a DELICIOUS wine. Cranberry Wine - whether this basic version, or our Homemade Cranberry Clementine Christmas Wine Recipe - is a favourite around here.

    A glass of red wine is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    It makes a pretty red wine, very fruit-forward with none of the aspects of traditional red wines that I DON’T like (bitterness, tannins, that cigarette taste, etc). Just a really bright, fun, pleasant drinking wine.

    Of course, like most/all wines, you’ll need to plan ahead. If you buy your cranberries this holiday season and put a batch on, you can be drinking your homemade wine NEXT holiday season.

    Which, you know, is great timing, as this goes particularly well with the kind of roast dinners that get served for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or the holiday season in general!

    As my husband says “It’s an adult way to drink cranberry juice!”

    A glass of red wine -made with this cranberry wine recipe - is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    How to Make Cranberry Wine

    If you haven't attempted making wine before, don't be intimidated, it’s not as complicated as you might think.

    Basically, you get some fruit, water, and sugar, toss some yeast in it, and let it go!

    Ok, it’s a bit more involved than that, but not by much! Be sure to check out our primer to home brewing, Check out our primer to home brewing:

    - Wine Making At Home, Part 1: Why?

    - Wine Making at Home, Part 2: Equipment to Get Started

    - Wine Making at Home, Part 3: The Brewing Process.

    - Wine Making at Home, Part 4: How to Stabilize and Back Sweeten Wine

    Just a small handful of entries, and you'll be good to go!

    A glass of red wine - made with this cranberry wine recipe - is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    Cranberry Wine Ingredients

    Spring Water

    While using tap water can be an option, we tend to use jugs of spring water. This is for a couple of reasons..

    First of all, tap water doesn’t always taste good - a hard (LOL) lesson we learned while living in Minneapolis.

    While our water here in Hamilton doesn’t even require a filter to taste fresh and clean at all times, we know that’s not the case for everyone. Bottled spring water won’t bring any weird, undesirable flavours to your wine.

    Additionally, nice and convenient: pre-measured, sterile, and handy.

    However, if your tap water is consistently tasty and safe, feel free to use that instead of bottled.

    Granulated Sugar

    We prefer to use granulated sugar for this - rather than brown sugar, etc - as the flavour is neutral enough to not cover up or weigh down the bright fruit flavour from the cranberries.

    A glass of red wine is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    Cranberries

    Those bags of fresh cranberries that are sold in the produce section in the fall and winter are what you’ll want to use to make this wine.

    Depending on what brand you have, you may end up a little over or short on the amount of cranberries you need, depending on the weights they’re sold in where you are.

    Not a huge deal - you can make this with plus or minus a bit of the cranberries - though I prefer to aim for “plus” when possible.

    Just be sure to pick through your cranberries when you open the bags up, and get rid of any bits that don’t belong, or cranberries that have gone bad.

    If you have a food processor, just run the cranberries though for a few seconds to break them up a bit. You don’t want them to be a puree, just chopped enough that their juices and flavours will leech out into the water/sugar mixture easily.

    A puree will make racking it a bit more difficult. Not impossible or anything, just more effort and more of a mess than is necessary!

    A large pot with chopped cranberries and water in it, steam rising from the mix.

    Larger Batches

    This recipe will make about a gallon of finished wine - but it's easy to scale the recipe up for bigger batches, as we normally do. Just multiply everything by the number of batches you'd like to make - aside from the yeast.

    We'll use a single packet of yeast for anything up to 5 gallons, then add a second one for anything up to 10 gallons, and so on.

    Back Sweetening Your Cranberry Wine

    Sometimes, you’ll find that the yeast went a bit too far with their smorgasbord, and you end up with a wine that’s drier than you’d like it to be.

    ... and that’s when you back sweeten it! You can read my How to Stabilize and Back Sweeten Wine post for information on how to back sweeten it.

    A glass of red wine is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white and black background.

    More Home Brewing Recipes!

    While you've got your current homebrew fermenting away, why not consider putting a batch of something else on, to occupy your wait time? Here are a few of my other wine, cider, and mead recipes:

    Wine Recipes

    Banana Wine Recipe
    Blackberry Wine Recipe
    Blackcurrant Wine Recipe
    Blueberry Wine Recipe
    Cherry Wine Recipe
    Cranberry Clementine Christmas Wine Recipe
    Faux Lingonberry Wine
    Lychee Wine Recipe
    Mango Strawberry Wine Recipe
    Mango Wine Recipe
    Mint Wine Recipe
    Lychee Wine Recipe
    Partridgeberry Wine Recipe
    Passionfruit Wine Recipe
    Peach Wine Recipe
    Stone Fruit Wine Recipe
    Strawberry Wine Recipe
    Ube Wine Recipe
    Watermelon Wine Recipe

    Mead Recipes

    Black Cherry Mead Recipe
    Blueberry-Clementine Mead Recipe
    Blueberry Mead Recipe
    Clementine Mead Recipe
    Pumpkin Mead Recipe
    Wildflower Mead Recipe

    Cider & Miscellaneous Homebrew Recipes

    Hard Apple Cider Recipe
    Home Brew Hard Iced Tea Recipe
    Maple Hard Apple Cider Recipe

    A glass of red wine -made with this cranberry wine recipe - is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    Share the Love!

    Be sure to take some pics of your handiwork! If you instagram it, be sure to tag me - @CelebrationGenerationCA - or post it to My Facebook Page - so I can cheer you on!

    Also, be sure to subscribe to my free monthly email newsletter, so you never miss out on any of my nonsense.

    Well, the published nonsense, anyway!

    *****

    A glass of red wine is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a white background.

    Close up photo of a glass of brilliantly red cranberry wine, in front of a white background.
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    5 from 1 vote

    Cranberry Wine

    Cranberries make a fantastic red wine. The hardest part about making cranberry wine is waiting - but it's worth it!
    Prep Time2 hrs
    Cook Time30 mins
    Resting Time365 d
    Total Time365 d 2 hrs 30 mins
    Course: Beverage
    Cuisine: French
    Servings: 1 Gallon
    Calories: 7053kcal
    Author: Marie Porter

    Equipment

    Large pot
    2 gallon fermenter bucket and lid
    1 - 2 1 gallon glass carboys
    1 air lock and stopper
    Siphon, siphon tubing.

    Ingredients

    • 1 gallon Spring Water
    • 3 lbs Granulated Sugar
    • 2 lbs Fresh Cranberries
    • 1 lb golden raisins
    • ½ teaspoon Acid Blend
    • ½ teaspoon Pectic Enzyme
    • 1 teaspoon Yeast Nutrient
    • 1 packet Red Star “Montrachet” yeast
    • Potassium sorbate or other wine stabilizer

    Instructions

    • Chop cranberries, set aside
    • In large stock pot – we used a 7.5 gallon turkey fryer – combine water and sugar. Heat to boiling, stirring until sugar is dissolved.
    • Add chopped cranberries, stir and continue to cook for 5 minutes.
    • Add acid blend, pectic enzyme, and yeast nutrient. Stir well, turn off heat. Cover with a lid, allow to cool to room temperature – overnight.
    • Place raisins and yeast in a freshly sanitized 2 gallon fermenting bucket.
    • Carefully pour the cranberries and water into the fermenting bucket.
    • Using sanitized equipment – take a gravity reading. Keep track of the number! (This is an optional step, but will allow you to calculate your final ABV %)
    • Cover with sanitized lid and air lock. Within 48 hours, you should notice fermentation activity – bubbles in the airlock, carbonation and /or swirling in the wine must. This means you’re good to go!
    • Let sit for about a week, stirring (sanitized paddle!) every couple of days or so.
    • After a week or so, use your sanitized siphon setup to rack the must into a freshly sanitized 1 gallon carboy.
    • Put the carboy somewhere cool (not cold!), and leave it alone for 2 months or so.
    • Using sanitized equipment, rack the wine off the sediment, into a clean, freshly sanitized 6.5 gallon carboy. Cap with sanitized airlock, leave it alone for another 2-3 months.
    • Rack one more time, leave it for another 3 months or so.
    • When your wine has been racked a few times and shows NO more fermenting activity for a month or so (no bubbles in the airlock, no more sediment being produced, you can move on to bottling, and back sweetening, if needed.
    • Follow the instructions on your selected type of wine stabilizer to stop fermentation. For potassium sorbate, this needs to be done 2-3 days before bottling.
    • Using sanitized equipment, take a final gravity reading, then rack the wine into clean, sanitized bottles. Cork.
      Age for at least a few months before drinking.

    Notes

    I’m not going to lie – the wine you bottle is going to be a little harsh. Drinkable, but definitely unrefined. Put the bottles into the cases they came in and forget about them for at least a few months– you’ll have a much tastier wine at the end of the wait!
    Our wine was smooth and tasty to drink 1 year to the date we made it, definitely fit to serve with the Thanksgiving dinner!
    IMPORTANT:
    Software generates nutritional information based on the ingredients as they start, and is unable to account for the sugars consumed in the fermentation process. As such, the calories, sugars, and carbs are shown WAY higher than reality.
    Additionally, the listed value is for the entire recipe, NOT per serving.

    Nutrition

    Calories: 7053kcal | Carbohydrates: 1832g | Protein: 19g | Fat: 3g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Sodium: 275mg | Potassium: 4155mg | Fiber: 60g | Sugar: 1663g | Vitamin A: 544IU | Vitamin C: 135mg | Calcium: 440mg | Iron: 11mg

    A glass of red wine is pictured next to a small bowl of fresh cranberries, against a black background.

    Related posts:

    A close up view of a wine glass with with a deep red wine. There are cranberries and orange peels at the base of the glass, against a white background. Christmas Wine A glass of blueberry wine in front of a pint of fresh blueberries. Blueberry Wine Recipe [Fresh or Frozen] Blackberry Wine Recipe Blackberry Wine Recipe [Fresh or Frozen] A glass of pale red strawberry wine. Strawberry Wine Recipe
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    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    1. Megan

      February 03, 2021 at 11:12 pm

      Hello. I was recently given 49 pounds of whole berry canned cranberry sauce. Needless to say we will not be eating that much corn syrup, so it needs to become wine. How can I adjust this recipe for the canned cranberry sauce? Each can is seven pounds.

      Reply
      • Marie Porter

        February 04, 2021 at 7:06 am

        I'm not even sure if you can make wine off it - it'll depend on the ingredients in it. If it's got preservatives in it, it's not likely to ferment at all.

        I guess if it were me, I'd probably ballpark the sugar content as being 1/4-1/3 of the weight, subtract that from the total, and proceed as if the remaining weight was fruit. You'd want to adjust the additional sugar based on the guesstimate of the weight of the sugar in the sauce.

        I've never made wine with corn syrup, so I have no idea how that would go. If you do it, let me know how it goes!

        Reply

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    Marie Porter


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