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The Secret Inside Every Cranberry
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Every October, bogs south of Boston turn into lakes of floating red.
Here's the thing: cranberries don't grow underwater. Most of the year, the bog is dry.
They grow on low vines in beds of sand and peat, like a scrubby carpet.
At harvest, growers flood the bog, just enough to cover the vines. Then machines nicknamed "egg-beaters" churn the water and knock the berries loose.
And up they pop, because every cranberry has 4 tiny air pockets inside. That same air does something else: it makes a good cranberry bounce.
Growers still sort cranberries by bounce today. Soft ones don't make the cut.
Long before any of it, the Wampanoag gathered wild cranberries, sasumuneash. On Martha's Vineyard, Aquinnah Wampanoag kids still get a day off school for Cranberry Day. And the vines? Some on Cape Cod are more than 150 years old, and still making berries.
Try the bounce test.
Drop a fresh cranberry on the counter. A good one bounces, and in a glass of water it floats, thanks to the tiny air pockets inside.
Data: Cape Cod Cranberry Growers' Association, USDA NASS, the Aquinnah Wampanoag Tribe and Ocean Spray.