Made with cranberry, orange and apples juices and sweetened with Red Hot cinnamon candies, a piping hot cup of Red Hot Cranberry Cider is just the type of cozy drink that holiday memories are made over year after year. A gorgeous ruby red and easy to make in the crock pot, it fills your home with all the warm aromas of the season and is perfect for holiday parties.
Crock Pot Apple Cranberry Cider
Every December, as the Christmas season begins, my family starts putting in their requests for what is fondly known at my house as simply the Christmas Drink. You might know it as Red Hot Cinnamon Cider or Hot Apple Cranberry Cider.
MORE CIDER RECIPES TO SIP: Sparkling Rosemary Apple Cider, Spiced Caramel Apple Cider (crock pot)
Whichever name you use, we never have a Christmas morning without a crock pot full of this simmering on the kitchen counter. It’s as much as part of Christmas for us as the tree and all its trimmings. It’s bright red color and the way its warm cinnamon waft and welcome friends and family make it a holiday celebration all by itself!
I’ll walk through an overview of ingredients & steps in this section along with helpful tips!
Look for specifics at the end of the post in the recipe card.
Simple Ingredients
- cranberry juice
- orange juice
- apple juice
- Red Hot candies
- cinnamon sticks
- fresh cranberries and orange slices as garnish (optional)
How to Make This Christmas Drink
This is an easy, one step recipe… Yes, ONE step! Pure cranberry juice, rounded out with apple and orange juice, goes straight into the crock pot with spicy Red Hot cinnamon candies and cinnamon sticks. As the candies melt, they add a sweet cinnamon kick and the ruby red color to the cocktail of fruit juices.
The results are a hot Christmas drink that is as Christmas-y as Christmas itself.
The lights are twinkling, and a crock pot full of Red Hot Cranberry Cider is filling the house with the wonderful holiday aromas of cinnamon and spices. I don’t know about you, but it’s beginning to look and smell a lot like Christmas!
Some Of My Serving Favorites When Celebrating with Red Hot Cranberry Cider
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Red Hot Cranberry Cider
Ingredients
- 4 C 100% Cranberry Juice no sugar added
- 3 C apple juice
- 3 C orangejuice no pulp
- 1 C Red Hot candies
- 2 cinnamon sticks
Garnishes
- orange slices
- fresh cranberries
Instructions
- Pour fruit juices into crock pot. Add candies and cinnamon sticks. Turn crock pot on high. Stir occasionally until candies are melted to make sure they don’t stick to the bottom. When candies are melted and drink is hot, garnish with orange slices and fresh cranberries and serve.
Sounds so good! What are the amounts of the liquid ingredients? Are the numbers for cups of each liquid? How much of the cinnamon candies are needed?
Thank you very much!
Hi, Aleane!
We had a couple of snags when we did some techy stuff on the back end of our website. It looks like this recipe was a victim of one of those snags! I am going to get right on getting that fixed. In the meantime, here are the measurements:
4 C cranberry juice
3 C apple juice
3 C orange juice
1 C Red Hot candies
I am so sorry that the recipe card was messed up. Hopefully it will be fixed by the time you see this reply and you can print the card to keep!
Thank you very much for the recipe details! I am going to make this recipe for Christmas Eve!
Merry Christmas! ~AleaneB
Oh, Aleane! You won’t be disappointed! I am so glad to hear that you are making it. You will love the sweet cinnamon-y taste and the wonderful way it fills the house with smells of Christmas! If you have time, email me a photo and I will feature it on the Southern Discourse Facebook page. It’s so fun to show off what people are making! Merry Christmas!
A Question!! What becomes of skins from cranberries, do you leave it in tea???,
Hi, Patricia! The cranberries are just garnish, so you don’t have to even put them in if you don’t want to. But I think they are so pretty, and everyone seems to love it. I just warn everyone not to eat them. They can be bitter! If the tea has been a while in the crock pot, some of the berries do burst. Just leave them in and dip around them!