{"id":104447,"date":"2021-11-25T05:41:46","date_gmt":"2021-11-25T12:41:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=104447"},"modified":"2021-11-25T16:23:37","modified_gmt":"2021-11-25T23:23:37","slug":"cranberries-and-corkscrews-on-thanksgiving-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2021\/11\/25\/cranberries-and-corkscrews-on-thanksgiving-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Cranberries And Corkscrews On Thanksgiving Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sorry, no birds today. Only a side dish for a bird.<\/p>\n

Have you ever noticed that Ocean Spray Cranberry Sauce cans are labeled upside down? There’s a reason for that and an alternative solution to the problem they’re trying to solve that I think is better. And more fun, especially if you have a corkscrew like mine.<\/p>\n

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Late yesterday afternoon I got a hilarious voicemail from Dennis, one of my best friends in high school and we remain very good friends today. Dennis is a lucky guy for at least two reasons – he lives on the shore of Montana’s beautiful Flathead Lake and he’s married to Betty Ann, one of my old high school sweethearts. When he made the call Dennis was stuck in bumper to bumper, pre-Thanksgiving traffic. He has no more patience with traffic than I do (which is saying a lot) and the vehicle in front of him was from Utah, both of which made him think of me so he gave me a call to “keep him from going ballistic”.<\/p>\n

I missed his call but part of his voicemail went something like this. To say he was agitated is an understatement:<\/p>\n

“I’m on a mission to buy a can of cranberries for Betty Ann but I’m stuck in traffic and do you think there’s a can of f****** cranberry sauce to be had in the entire f****** Flathead Valley? No, there’s not! So I’m going to meet my brother Tom at a local watering hole and have a stiff one before I go home to Betty Ann emptyhanded”.<\/em><\/p>\n

That call from Dennis made my day. And reminded me of a tip about serving canned cranberry sauce that I thought I’d pass on to my blog followers.<\/p>\n

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Ocean Spray Cranberry Sauce, both whole berry and regular sauce, have the labels on upside down by design. The actual top of the can, the only part that a can opener will work on, is upside down relative to the label. You have to turn the label upside down to get the can opener to work on the “top”.<\/p>\n

Ocean Spray does that deliberately so that folks can get the contents of the can out in one big slick “log” rather than having to dig the contents out in chunks with a spoon. It’s complicated and a bit tricky but the process recommended by Ocean Spray is fully explained in this recent CNN article<\/a><\/span><\/span>.<\/p>\n

But years ago I thought of a better, faster way.<\/p>\n

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I open the top (bottom?) of the can as Ocean Spray intended.<\/p>\n

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Then I turn it over in the serving dish (I inherited this old-timey dish from my mother) and punch a hole in the other side with my handy-dandy (and randy) wine corkscrew. The hole breaks the vacuum inside the can so its contents can…<\/p>\n

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slide out in one continuous log, slick as a whistle. My corkscrew looks proud of his accomplishment, don’t you think?<\/p>\n

Apparently lots of folks like to serve it like this but I think it looks obviously canned and sort of cheap so…<\/p>\n

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I stir it up so it more closely resembles home-stewed cranberries. Personally, I think canned is as tasty as home-stewed.<\/p>\n

My method is quicker and slicker, doesn’t dirty a spoon and it’s more fun, with an elementary physics lesson about vacuums built in, so I thought I’d pass it along.<\/p>\n

Happy Thanksgiving!<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

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Notes: <\/em><\/p>\n