How to Make Sugared Holiday Garnish

A garnish – no matter how extravagant or simple – can make a recipe look and taste better. Since we eat with our eyes first, one should never skip out on making a dish look better. For the holidays, I often prepare a Sugared Holiday Garnish to make something look extra special!

Thanksgiving and Christmas are upon us and it’s time to take the extra step when preparing your favourite holiday dinners and desserts. If you’ve got company coming, you have all the more reason to dress up that turkey platter or to serve that trifle with all of the bells and whistles. Today, I’ll tell you How to Make Sugared Holiday Garnish with just a few simple ingredients. Use this garnish wherever possible during the holidays!

Most of my holiday-themed recipes were prepared and photographed months ago and I’d like to say that I have saved the best for last, but that’s not true, because, in my opinion, they’re all the best! I had baked, cooked, and photographed most of my holiday recipes before the end of summer, but I couldn’t make this one until just a few days ago. With good reason, I assure you! I needed fresh cranberries for this recipe, which were hard to find too long before Thanksgiving.

O CRANBERRY, CRANBERRY, WHEREFORE ART THOU CRANBERRY?

Have you been reading my blog for any length of time? If you have, you will already be aware of what I’m about to discuss. If you haven’t, it’s important that you understand how frustrating it can be to be a food blogger at times. Food bloggers are always working ahead of schedule. When it comes to Christmas recipes, for example, we are baking cakes and cookies as early as September!

We do this so that we can test the recipes to make sure that they will work for you at home. The recipes need to be plated and styled. Photographs need to be taken. We have to write up the post and make sure we please the folks at Google, otherwise, our recipes run the risk of being buried in cyberspace somewhere. There are many other steps that I’m skipping here, but all of it is to say that we need the time to get the recipes out to you a few weeks before you need them.

Now, as a huge fan of Christmas baking – the 200+ Christmas recipes here at Lord Byron’s Kitchen are proof of that – there’s one thing that frustrates me every single year. There’s a tremendous lack of things like fresh cranberries for many months of the year. Don’t even get me started on holiday confections like Hershey’s chocolate or candy canes! Luckily, here in Canada, we celebrate Thanksgiving in October, so I was able to get my hands on the cranberries used in this garnish!

SUBSCRIBE NOW AND NEVER MISS ANOTHER RECIPE!

So, welcome, Dear Reader, to the start of my annual holiday-themed recipes. Traditionally, every year I share a series of recipes that you might already be familiar with. For example, I’ve previously shared 12 Holiday Trifles, 12 Holiday Bars & Squares, and even these 12 Edible Holiday Wreath recipes! Also, some of my favourite recipe collections from previous years are my 75 Homemade Gifts from Your Kitchen, my 50 Make Ahead Freezer Friendly Christmas Recipes, and my 30 No-Bake Christmas Recipes post.

This year I’m doing it differently. Rather than sharing multiple back to back series, I’m sharing a new holiday-themed recipe almost every day from now until Christmas Eve. For those of you who have followed my annual Lord Byron’s 24 Cookies of Christmas series, don’t worry, you will still get lots of new cookie recipes this year too. I will not, however, be publishing the cookies back to back in a 24-day series. This would have been my 8th year running the series and it becomes very exhausting, so this year, I’m spreading the recipes out so that I’m not sharing the same type of recipe every day.

You really don’t want to miss one of these recipes, so if you have not yet subscribed to Lord Byron’s Kitchen, I encourage you to do so. That way, a new recipe will be emailed to you every day. You won’t have to bother to come looking for it! And, just in case you’re curious, you can see previous annual posts for my 24 Cookies of Christmas Series here!

INGREDIENTS NEEDED TO PREPARE THIS RECIPE

The following is a list of the ingredients needed to prepare this recipe. For exact amounts and measurements, refer to the printable recipe card located near the bottom of this post.

• Cranberries – You will need fresh cranberries here; frozen and thawed cranberries will absolutely not work!
• Rosemary – I love to use sugared rosemary as a garnish, however, you can just do the cranberries if you wish.
• Sage Leaves
• Water
• Light Corn Syrup – There are a lot of misconceptions about corn syrup because one of them is bad for you and the other one is just liquid sugar extracted from corn. We are using the latter, which won’t hurt anyone in moderation.
• Sugar

HOW TO M AKE SUGARED HOLIDAY GARNISH

To prepare the sugared cranberries, rosemary, and sage, whisk together the light corn syrup and water. Coat the cranberries, rosemary sprigs, and sage leaves with the mixture by tossing them with the corn syrup mixture. Spread the sugar on a baking sheet and roll the coated cranberries, rosemary, and sage into the sugar until well covered. Transfer them to a wire cooling rack with a baking sheet underneath. Set aside for 2 hours to dry. Do not cover and do not refrigerate.

QUESTIONS?

If I have not answered all of your questions in the text above, don’t hesitate to reach out to me! You can contact me by sending me a message in the comments section further down the page. I will try my best to answer as soon as possible! You might reach me even faster by following me on Facebook and sending me a private message. Scroll down to follow me and never miss another recipe!