‘Tis the season for leftover repurposing. Use your leftover cranberry sauce for this Cranberry Bourbon Cocktail!
If your Thanksgiving feast resembled my family’s, you have about 12 trillion pounds of leftovers and are looking for places to stash them.
Don’t throw them away!
There are plenty of ways we can use leftovers without getting sick of them.
There is a slew of recipes for Thanksgiving leftovers floating around the intraverse.
Plus, last year, I rounded up 50 Thanksgiving Leftover Recipes, giving you options for excess turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and cranberry sauce.
Which reminds me of something I’ve been meaning to tell you. Cranberry sauce is my favorite leftover to play with.
Each year, I make Cranberry Sauce with Ginger and Maple, which yields a ton of sauce and results in leftovers.
Last year, I made cranberry vinaigrette for my Thanksgiving Leftovers Salad, and Cranberry Sauce Pancakes with the leftover sauce.
This year, I figured I’d go the beverage route by mixing some of the leftover sauce with Bourbon.
If you like yourself a cocktail, I highly recommend you try this!
The warmly-spiced flavorful sauce goes really well with the liquor, and because the cranberry sauce is cane-sugar free (sweetened only with maple syrup) it adds natural sweetness to the drink without being overly sweet.
And now I will address the elephant in the room: chunks in your cocktail. Can you hack it?
I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about my bourbon hanging out with hunks of cranberries, but I loved it. I drank it with a spoon.
If you’re anti texture, you can make a daiquiri slash slush situation by blending these cocktails up in your blender.
My favorite part of the cocktail was eating the cranberries that had been soaking in bourbon at the bottom of the glass…so there is that to consider.
I hope you all had a wonderful and meaningful Thanksgiving, and enjoy all the repurposed Thanksgiving leftovers!

Cranberry Sauce Bourbon Cocktail
A delicious cocktail perfect for using up leftover homemade cranberry sauce!
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons homemade or store-bought cranberry sauce
- 1 to 2 shots bourbon
- Ginger beer or club soda
- 1 lemon wedge
Instructions
- Add the cranberry sauce to the bottom of a glass along with the bourbon.
- Add ice, then fill the remainder of the glass with ginger beer (or club soda)
- Squeeze a lemon wedge into the drink and stir well.
- Bottoms up!
Nutrition Information
Yield 1 Serving Size 1 cocktailAmount Per Serving Calories 195Unsaturated Fat 0gCarbohydrates 13gFiber 1gSugar 11g

Olga
Saturday 17th of November 2018
Absolutely delicious, definitely making this one to spice up the Thanksgiving dinner! Love it!
Terry
Thursday 4th of December 2014
Well, I made cranberry sauce from fresh cranberries and forgot it in the fridge until everyone had "gone through the line". I did put it on the table but not many people back-tracked to partake of the sauce sooooo, I had a big bowl left over. I saw this post and got really excited! Finally got to the liquor store today for the bourbon and am at this point munching on the bourbon-soaked berries in the bottom of the glass....this recipe is a 10! Thanks :-)
Joanne
Tuesday 2nd of December 2014
What a happy coincidence! The ONLY leftovers I have are cranberry sauce. I see all the drinks in my future.
kate / vegukate
Tuesday 2nd of December 2014
i'm kind of all over this ! !
francesca
Monday 1st of December 2014
Is it weird to say that mashed potatoes and cocktails are my favorite part of thanksgiving? Not together, of course.
Julia
Monday 1st of December 2014
Not at all weird. Carbs + booze are how we survive the holidays ;)