Sugar Free Instant Pot Cranberry Sauce

This Sugar Free Instant Pot Cranberry Sauce is made with only 3 ingredients. It’s a healthy sauce containing fresh cranberries, orange zest and sweetener that is perfect for those on low carb or keto. Add everything to the instant pot, pressure cook it for 3 minutes and you have the best Thanksgiving or holiday side dish.

✨ Recipe Highlights

• It’s cooked from start to finish in under 20 minutes.
• It’s sugar free making it great for those who are low carb and keto.
• Save room on the stove top during the holidays by making it in the instant pot.
• It’s a great make ahead cranberry sauce.
• By making it from scratch, you can control the ingredients to make it healthy.
• It can be frozen and thawed for later use.

📝 Ingredients You’ll Need

• Fresh Cranberries: these are usually in season in the fall months and can be found in most grocery stores. 
• Orange Zest: This is taken from the skin of an orange and is a great contrast in flavor to the cranberries.
• Sugar Free Sweetener: You can use any kind of sugar free granulated sweetener you like. I used Erythritol in this recipe but you could also use powdered stevia or monk fruit.
• Pressure Cooker: I like using my Instant Pot or Ninja Foodi all in one on the pressure cook setting.

NOTE: Different sweeteners have different levels of sweet taste. Be sure to add a little at a time until desired level of sweetness is achieved.

📖 How To Make Cranberry Sauce in the Instant Pot

1️⃣ Add ingredients to Instant Pot: Add fresh cranberries to the instant pot along with the orange zest. Pour in ¼ cup of water.

2️⃣ Pressure cook: Set the instant pot to manual HIGH pressure for 3 minutes and seal.

3️⃣ Natural release pressure: Once finished cooking, let instant pot natural release for 10 minutes before removing the lid.

4️⃣ Mash and sweeten: Using a spoon, mash up the cranberries until they form a sauce. Stir in the sweetener until fully combined.

🧑‍🍳 Chef’s Tips

Using Frozen Cranberries: If you can’t find fresh cranberries, you could also use frozen ones. Simply add 2 more minutes to the pressure cook time making it a total of 5 minutes. This will make it take longer to come to pressure as the cranberries will have to be thawed in the instant pot.

Paleo Cranberry Sauce: To make this recipe paleo, replace the sweetener with ⅓ cup honey or maple syrup.

Whole30 Cranberry Sauce: To make this recipe Whole30 compliant, replace the sweetener with ⅓ cup of unsweetened apple juice or apple cider. You could also use the juice of your orange instead. 

🔁 Variations

Add sugar-free juice like pineapple juice, orange juice or apple cider instead of water.

Add warming spices like cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. Better yet, sprinkle in some pumpkin pie spice before cooking.

Add in some diced apples and a sprig of rosemary.

❓FAQ’s

More Healthy Holiday Recipes

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Sous Vide Mashed Potatoes
Gluten Free StuffingAir Fryer Turkey Breast
Cranberry Curd Tart