Cranberry Sweet Potato Casserole
Cranberry Sweet Potato Casserole is filled with cranberries, pecan, and pomegranates. Perfect as a Thanksgiving or Christmas side dish!
Thanksgiving is this week and everywhere I look I’ve been seeing some amazing Thanksgiving side dish recipes. You know I’m going to have pecan apple stuffing and mashed potatoes on my table this year because it wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without them but yesterday I got a request from my guy for sweet potatoes and because I love him so much sweet potatoes have now be added to the menu.
Melinda and I made this Cranberry Sweet Potato Casserole recently so I already had the perfect recipe. Cranberries, pecan, sweet potatoes, all of those flavors make a sweet and savory side dish that is perfect for Thanksgiving. It’s pretty simple to make. You thinly slice some peeled sweet potatoes and then toss them in a mixture of melted butter and cinnamon. Then you layer them in a greased casserole dish. I started with a layer flat on the bottom and I sprinkled them with brown sugar. Then went back in and made the second layer cover the gaps from the first layer. That leaves perfect little pockets for the cranberries to nestle in to! The last ingredient before you stick the cranberry sweet potato casserole in the oven is orange juice and orange zest. We sprinkled the zest over the potatoes and then squeezed the orange over them. That citrus juice goes perfectly with the tart cranberries and both just highlight the sweetness of the sweet potatoes. Sprinkle a little cinnamon over the top and then cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake it in a 400 degree F oven for 45-50 minutes or until a fork can slide easily into the potatoes. What are sweet potatoes without marshmallows, right? Remove the casserole from the oven, sprinkle with marshmallows, and then return to the oven for 5 minutes or so until the marshmallows are toasted.
When it comes out of the oven it smells amazing and you’re going to want to dig right in but don’t skip sprinkling the pecans and pomegranate arils over the casserole. It gives it a nice added crunch and the pomegranate seeds and delicious and beautiful. It totally makes the dish!
It’s a pretty awesome casserole with all of the flavors we love in a more traditional sweet potato casserole and the added brightness of cranberries and pomegranates. It’s beautiful and delicious and I know everyone is going to love it.
Coconut Sweet Potato Casserole from Bread Booze Bacon
Baked Sweet Potato Donuts from I Heart Eating
Sweet Potato Dinner Rolls from Kleinworth & Co.
Candied Sweet Potato Stacks from Cooking with Curls
Cranberry Sweet Potato Casserole from Home.Made.Interest.
Harvest Chicken Sheet Pan Dinner from The Creative Bite
Butter Pecan Sweet Potatoes from Liz on Call
Sweet potatoes aren’t just for Thanksgiving, Christmas is just around the corner and nothing goes better with ham than sweet potatoes! If you’re looking for some more amazing sweet potato recipes to get you through the holidays make you sure you check out some of our favorite bloggers’ recipes!
Cranberry Sweet Potato Casserole
Ingredients
- 3 Sweet potatoes, sliced into 1/4" thick slices
- 1/4 cup Butter, melted
- 1/2 cup Brown Sugar, divided
- 1 cup Fresh Cranberries
- 1/2 teaspoon Cinnamon
- 1 Orange, zested and juiced
- 1 cup Marshmallows
- 1/3 cup Pecans, roughly chopped
- 1/2 cup Pomegranate arils
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F
- Grease a 9x13 baking dish.
- Toss the sweet potato slices in the melted butter then lay a single layer in the bottom of the casserole dish.
- Sprinkle the layer with ¼ cup of brown sugar.
- Place another layer of sweet potato slices covering the gaps in the first layer.
- Sprinkle with the remaining brown sugar.
- Scatter the cranberries over the top of the sweet potatoes and sprinkle with orange zest. Pour the juice of the orange over the sweet potatoes.
- Sprinkle with cinnamon.
- Cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake for 45-50 minutes or sweet potatoes are soft.
- Remove the foil and sprinkle the top with marshmallows then return to the oven for 5 minutes or until marshmallows are toasted.
- Sprinkle top of the casserole with the pecans and pomegranate arils.
- Enjoy!
Nutrition
Happy holidays!
The marshmallows look like they just disappear – is that right? I don’t see any after it’s done.. do they just make it looked glazed? It looks beautiful but looks a little soupy, too?
The marshmallows do just bake into the potatoes. They still add a nice sweetness. If you’d like to have some toasted marshmallows you can just add them in the last 5 minutes. The sauce just glazes the potatoes and there will be some soup sauce in the bottom. We just ladled it right over the potatoes. It is delicious!
Thanks for replying, Kat! I have a dress rehearsal Thanksgiving meal this Friday and I think this will be my recipe to rehearse.
Let me know how they turn out!
Would this do well to make the day before and reheat?
Kat, my casserole turned out beautiful! It was so pretty w/the cranberries and pomegranates. My marshmallows roasted instead of glazing the sweet potatoes – probably because I was running late and put the oven on 425 instead of 400. It cooked in 30 minutes. I used half butter and 1/2 coconut oil to coat the sweet potatoes just because I’m cooking w/ coconut oil more these days. I only used 1/2 the orange for juice and added about 1 teaspoon of orange marmalade to the juice because I was concerned it would be too soupy. I used a little bit less brown sugar. It was good and everyone loved it. I think it’s a keeper. I’m going to definitely make it for Thanksgiving. I got 2 requests for the recipe. Thanks so much for sharing this beautiful recipe! Happy Thanksgiving!
I’m SOOOO happy to hear it turned out well and everyone liked it. Thank you so much for checking back in. It always makes my day when someone enjoys a recipe as much as we did.
I’m wondering w/Rani if it could be cooked the day before and reheated in the microwave for Thanksgiving. I have an hour & a half drive. I will say I didn’t get to taste my casserole until it was cooled down – I was the last in line and it was still very tasty. So….
This is my new way to make sweet potatoes!!! They are super fragrant and not too sweet!
Yay! So glad you liked them.
These sweet potatoes are one of my families favorite during the holiday season.
What kind of cranberries did you use? Fresh, dry or from a can?
Fresh cranberries!
Do you soak the cranberries or use just dry cranberries. Maybe you mean dried like a raisin type cranberry??
Hi Paula, we used whole, fresh cranberries. They cook down and mix with the sugar, it’s delicious!
Do the potatoes get soft/tender enough?
Yes they are nice and soft. Make sure to cut them 1/4 inch.
Would this hold up making it the day before and just reheating in the oven?
Hi Amanda, I think that would be fine! I find that potatoes (sweet or regular) are the easiest thing to reheat.
Can this be frozen after it’s baked and then reheated on the dinner day?
I’m sorry I haven’t tried freezing this recipe so I’m not certain.
How beautiful! I’d love to try this – I suppose I could use walnuts instead of pecans?
Definitely!
Wondering can I make this ahead of time and just refrigerate for a day or 2 before baking?
I’ve never tried that so I’m really not sure if it would work BUT sweet potatoes are usually pretty good reheated so it night work.
This was a big hit for Thanksgiving. It makes a beautiful dish. Followed receipe exactly with no issues. It’s very easy to make. I will definitely be making this again.
This dish is fantastic! It was a perfect addition to the meal!
I did make a couple of adjustments when I made it… I used four sweet potatoes and did four layers sprinkling two tablespoons of brown sugar per layer. In my opinion, while the pomegranate arils are pretty I don’t feel they’re necessary and seem to be a bit overpowering in taste and texture for this dish.
Will definitely be making this again!
Elizabeth, question for you please.
I made this for Thanksgiving and it was wonderful! I will be making it again for Christmas but will need to double and do four layers . Did you have to bake it longer?? Thanks!
I would advise against doubling and making 4 layers. It will get mushy. You can make two separate dishes. We tried this for Thanksgiving last week and it completely changed the texture of the sweet potatoes. It became more like mashed sweet potatoes. Hope this helps!
Thanks!
OMG! I am not normally one to write comments but this is just amazing! I made this for my family for thanksgiving this year and it was my favorite dish! Perfectly sweet and just absolutely delicious. I was gonna make my moms traditional mashed sweet potato casserole but came across this recipe and decided to try it out instead and it was such a good decision. You will not regret this dish for any holiday meal.
