Food Gift Cyber Shopping: Direct From the Little Guys

I may not have been among the 226 million Americans who went shopping this past holiday weekend, but today is a different story.  Today, Cyber Monday, is a great way to get online deals and a reminder that one of the most comfortable, least stressful ways to Christmas shop is on your computer, from the comfort of your own home.

Food gifts from cookies to cheese are perennial holiday favorites, particularly when shopping for office gifts.  Sites like Williams-Sonoma and Dean andDeluca are gold standards, always there you with the requisite Tower of Treats or box of petit fours to give to secretaries.  This year Tasting Table’s shopping section is making a big push for a slice of the business and year-old Gilt Taste is in the game too with edibles ranging from gourmet macarons to gluten-free vegan brownies. 

Regardless of the offers of free shipping and special discount codes, I’m always in favor of supporting the small producer, buying direct, and giving a unique food gift to friends or colleagues in the process.  Thanks to the egalitarian World Wide Web, even the most humble candy maker in Spokane, Washington making the world’s best soft peanut brittle can take an order online and ship wherever you want it to go.  Be sure and reward yourself for clever, carefree shopping by putting a little something extra in the virtual shopping basket, destination you. 

Chocolate Honey Cakes from Bee Desserts:  I have known the proprietor of Bee Desserts for years, when her Brazilian café was serving caipirinhas and burgers and desserts were more of a personal addiction than business venture.  But Claudia struck gold in my opinion a few years back when she started to manufacture these pint-sized cakes.  With the look of a Ding Dong or brightly colored hockey puck, the cakes unwrap to reveal a hard chocolate casing surrounding a moist interior cake sweetened with honey.  With five to a box, there is more than enough to pass around an office.  Best part is these freeze well, potentially prolonging the sugar rush well past Christmas Day.  Favorites: Classic Chocolate Honey Cake and Almond Honey Cake.

Cheese and More from Beehive Cheese Company:  I first fell for the cheese from this Utah producer after one bite of Barely Buzzed, a cheddar-like cheese with the rind rubbed with coffee and lavender.  After visiting their tasting room recently, I discovered this little company does more than just cheese.  To go with the cheese Beehive does a small production of rusks, a triangular cracker made with whole grains that pairs exceptionally well with a range of cheese from the local salt and honey rubbed Seehive to Smoked Apple Walnut.  Beehive is also a huge promoter of other local artisans making everything from salami to chocolate, much of which they sell in their cute, yellow tasting room. The Party Box on the Beehive website is a good way to give a taste of everything from the region- rusks, Creminelli salami, Pepperlane Jalapeno Pepper Preserves, chocolate from Chocolot, and of course, cheese.  Favorites: Rosemary rusks, Barely Buzzed Cheese, Seehive Cheese.

Soft Peanut Brittle and Butter Toffee from Bruttles:  It is remarkable I ever discovered this gem of a classic candy store in Spokane, Washington considering people who have lived there for years don’t always know about it.  The signature candy of this old fashioned shop is their soft peanut brittle.  The store shelves are lined with jars of saltwater taffy and foil wrapped chocolates.  But one cannot leave this store, online or in person, without trying the individually wrapped Bruttles.  An offspring of the popular soft peanut brittle, the best way to describe this unique candy is that it is like a homemade Butterfinger.  I have never tasted anything quite like it.  The sampler box is a nice way to try their full range of classic candies.  One thing is for sure, if you give the gift of Bruttles, you probably don’t have to worry about anyone else giving the same gift, at least this year.  Favorites: Bruttles, soft peanut brittle, butter toffee

Amy Powell is a food and travel writer based in New York City. She is a graduate of Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration and the French Culinary Institute. Follow her on Twitter @amymariepowell

 

Weird and Wonderful Food Gifts

It’s never too early to start thinking about holiday gifts, or at least that’s what the department stores have brainwashed me into thinking.  Over the years I have found that early shopping does take some of the stress out of the process, avoiding the full frontal assault of the last minute rush.  Starting early and giving the process more thought also allows for more creativity that the typical run through the mall- unusual websites, little known specialty stores, even craft markets and vintage stores all become targets for off-the-beaten path gifts, often with better stock than come December 24^th. 

Here are a few food related websites with global influences.  For the cook friend who has everything, the hostess you’d like to thank with something more thoughtful than a bottle of wine, or the in-laws that put you up for the Thanksgiving holiday- these online stores are full of culinary delights sure to inspire.

Bram (www.bramcookware.com)- Just as I was falling in love with my new Chilean clay bean pot (from Pomaireware purchased at Kitchen Table in Walnut Creek, CA), a walk around the square in downtown Sonoma brought me to clay pot Nirvana in the form of Bram, a store devoted entirely to clay cooking vessels.  Bram, named after a specific type of half-glazed Egyptian clay pot, is a shrine to all things clay cooking.  Crammed between the shop’s narrow walls I found hand painted Moroccan tagines in vibrant colors, unglazed South American bean pots, and Spanish glazed cazuelas. From the humble unglazed red clay variety to intricately patterned hand painted serving dishes from Egypt, Bram has dish to fill your clay cooking fantasies.  If I was looking for inspiration on using these vessels, a wall of books, including the wonderful Mediterranean Clay PotCooking by Paula Wolfert, was there to help me on the way.  For friends who will appreciate a new pot as lovely to look at as it is fun to cook with, clay is the way to go. 

Far West Fungi (www.farwestfungi.com)- It took one taste of truffle salt to know that this was a gift I would not stop giving.  At Far West Fungi, a mushroom-themed store in San Francisco’ Ferry Building, sales clerks encouraged me to dip a finger into the pungent jar of sea salt flecked with bits of fabled Italian black truffle.  In my mouth the effect was so complete and intoxicating I could have been sitting down to a $90 plate of truffle linguine.  For only $24 however, this reasonable luxury could dust scrambled eggs in the morning, finish off a medium rare fillet mignon just off the grill, or simply top a wedge of really good unsalted butter to smear on a crust of warm French bread.  While you’re at it, fungi loving friends might also enjoy growing their own.  Far West sells kits to get started growing one’s very own shitake or oyster mushroom mini farm.  While most people are eating chocolate Yule logs, your friends can brag about their very first Christmas mushroom log. 

Stinky Brooklyn (http://www.stinkybklyn.com/cheese-of-the-month-club1.html)- Stinky Brooklyn is a, well, more aromatic alternative to your mama’s fruit-of-the-month club.  Food or wine-of-the-month clubs gifts are the holiday gift that keeps on giving- it is easy to see why this form of food giving has not just persisted over the years, but grown.  The holidays are weighed down with enough food already, it is nice to think that your food gift, in this case three .5lb selections of artisanal cheese, will arrive at your loved one’s door every month for three months, just in time for those New Year’s resolutions.  Sure there are other cheese-of-the-month clubs (Murray’s and Artisanal are two notable ones), but Stinky’s wins points for sheer amusement in the name.  Who wouldn’t smile when a fresh shipment of Stinky’s show’s up at the door? 

Amy Powell is a food and travel writer based in New York City. She is a graduate of Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration and the French Culinary Institute. Follow her on Twitter @amymariepowell