Gourmet food gifts that are sure to please

Food and gourmet gifts are always popular and even more than at the holidays when there are many people who may not be able to afford to purchase these items for themselves. There are some food gifts that are practical, some that are great for families and some that are just indulgences. 

Food and gourmet gifts are as much fun to give as they are to receive. These gifts are also wonderfully easy to give, a few clicks of your mouse will have all your gift orders scheduled for holiday delivery. Imagine the look of joy on the face of the recipients when these gourmet delights arrive.

Practical Food Gifts

If you are looking for a food gift for your meat-loving friends, a package of great steaks from Omaha Steaks will be well received. You can also go with Kansas City Steaks or Corky's Ribs.

If you are looking for a little more healthy option, Harry and David offers fruit baskets for families and singles in a variety of sizes. You can choose to order just one box or a year full of delicious fruit. These are not just your average fruits either; they sell  perfect examples.

For the gourmet chef, why not choose a selection of spices in a pretty gift box from the Spice House This is a gift that will keep on giving all year long. How about a delicious selection of jams and jellies or chutneys from Stonewall Kitchen. These will certainly be very welcome gifts. If you are sending your gift early they even offer a gingerbread house kit that will be a wonderful gift for your favorite family. 

Families

A great food gift for a family is a bag or basket from Wolferman's.  This can include their signature English muffins, breads, desserts, jams, and jellies. They have little muffins, standard size, and giant and they come in a wide variety of flavors.

A coffee basket from  Green Mountain Coffee can come with Ghirardelli Hot Chocolate and they also offer tea choices. The Popcorn Factory has gift ideas set and ready to go for the holidays. What a great family gift along with a movie.

Indulgence

When it comes to indulgences, brownies rank right up there. The Food Network has named  Sugardaddys the best of the best after they won a throwdown against Bobby Flay. These luscious beauties will impress anyone. You can go brunette or Blondie, nutty, minty or spicy, they have it all. This is a totally indulgent gift for someone who will appreciate a "couture" brownie.

When you think gourmet chocolate the Belgian chocolate, Godiva comes to mind. They have expanded beyond just their signature truffles and filled chocolates to include cakes, cupcakes, brownies, and cookies. Deliveries can be scheduled to arrive just in time for the holidays.

Want to send a gift of gourmet cheese, truffles or caviar? You can find it all at this one-stop gourmet food store.  

The Gourmet Food Store has cheeses from around the world and will make up baskets with whatever you choose.

Fortnum and Mason, the London cornerstone, has been offering wonderful food hampers for all occasions for as long as anyone can remember. You can have a gourmet picnic basket packed with every indulgence you want to include.

Food and gourmet gifts are one of the most popular gifts to give and to receive, Christmas is no exception. If you prefer to pack your own gifts you can order pieces from most of these retailers or just use their packages as a template for making your own.

Confessions of a habitual cookbook collector

At some point, the exact year escapes me, I joined a cookbook club and suddenly I had four new cookbooks, which soon multiplied to eight and twelve since I was terrible at returning the cards on time. What I realized somewhere along the way was that I enjoy reading cookbooks. This began my next phase of collecting. I enjoyed reading about Southern cooking, Shaker cooking and cooking at The White House.

Celebrity recipe favorites soon joined my collection. Everywhere I went I looked for a new book to add to my collection. In 1995 we had a catastrophic house fire and I lost most of my cookbooks, I was devastated, years of collecting went down the tubes. At some point, I realized that by haunting antique stores and flea markets, I could replace many if not all of my cookbooks. One that I have never replaced is my 1890′s White House Cookbook.

In the past nineteen years, I have gone on to a whole new phase of cookbook collecting as we changed our eating habits. During the Atkins years, it was all about meat and Barbara Kafka’s Roasting Cookbook offered me many ways to make my meat taste really good. All my baking cookbooks became strictly reading material, and I added several slow cooker books to my hoard.

The Atkins years are over and I revel in my collection of cookie, cake and bread books. I love reading Jim Fobel's "Old Fashioned Baking Book" and "Just Like Grandma used to Make" by Lois Wyse. Natalie Dupre sold me on Southern Cooking long before Paula Dean made it a household word. Every vacation was an opportunity to pick up a new cookbook.

A trip to Vienna gave me "Imperial Austrian Cuisine" by Renata Wagner Wittula. Our cruise to Bermuda added "The Royal Caribbean International Cookbook". My all-time favorite cookbooks for actually cooking are "50 Ways to Cook Anything" and Good Housekeeping’s paperback "Cooking with Susan". I still love to read "Cooking for Madam" by Marta Sgubin about her years cooking for Jackie O.

As we were getting closer to retirement I began trying to downsize. I can’t stop collecting cookbooks but I have made a deal with myself. If one comes in, one must go out. It makes me think really hard about adding a new book, which old book will I part with. Luckily I have several by authors who will remain unnamed that I am happy to see go. I have fallen victim to impulse buying and realized after the fact that these books add nothing to my collection.

How many cookbooks do I have? Several hundred I am sure and while I don’t expect the collection to grow I know it will evolve. The wonderful thing about cookbook collecting is that it is a reflection of our own personality. It is also very affordable, you don’t have to be wealthy to have a fantastic cookbook collection as a matter of fact if you buy second hand or from discount shelves, it can be very inexpensive.

Collecting cookbooks doesn’t take any special knowledge, you don’t have to spend a lot of money and you can start slow and add on as you find your favorite author or type. Maybe you like baking cookbooks, there certainly are plenty to choose from. You might want to start with A Passion for Baking by Marcy Goodman. The sky is the limit. If you want older books you can search second-hand bookstores or antique stores. For new books, Amazon has an amazing variety as does Barnes and Noble.

No two people will ever have duplicate collections. Let friends and family know you enjoy cookbooks and they will turn up among your Christmas and birthday gifts. Becoming a cookbook collector can become an obsession, a delicious one. All you need is the space to store your collection.

Jam n Eggs Glens Falls New York

Jam n Eggs in Glen Falls New York offers breakfast and lunch daily. We stopped in on a Tuesday morning in late August and it was quiet at 9:30 a.m. What attracted me to this restaurant was the fact that they offer Eggs Benedict and reviews of the restaurant claim that it is the best that diners have ever tasted. Who could resist that? Not me.





I did order the eggs Benedict and while the hollandaise sauce may not be quite as good as the one at Max Amore, which I personally think is the best in the world, it was a very good benny. What I did like was that they serve it with ham as opposed to Canadian bacon and it was much more flavorful than the Canadian bacon. The poached egg was cooked perfectly and the yoke added the lusciousness that one expects from a benny. The homes fries were very good as well.



Al ordered the regular stack of blueberry pancakes. These three behemoths were double the amount that he could eat. They were well loaded with blueberries and had some serious depth to them. Flavor was excellent and he took the leftovers with him to eat the next day.


Joe had fried eggs and toast and the eggs were perfectly cooked. With our coffee, juice and hot chocolate, we had plenty of food to fuel our morning of travel. A very good breakfast for sure.

#jamneggsglensfalls

Bravo an American Bistro Providence RI

I have been eating at Bravo for years. It was for many years, my go-to restaurant whenever I was in Providence. Then, as often happens, I stopped hanging out in Providence. There is really no reason for it, things just happen. Now, the only reason I go to Providence is to attend the NERGC or a performance at the Providence Performing Arts Center. 

On September 24th Kasey and I went to attend a Sunday matinee performance of Les Miz. We wanted to grab lunch before the shoe and I remembered Bravo. It is only 4 or 5 blocks from the theater and if we were lucky enough to find on-street parking, we would save the $20 it costs to park near the performing arts center. We found a spot right across the street from Bravo. 

I should have made reservations but I didn't. It was very busy and without reservations, we had a choice of at the bar or a high-top table in the bar, we chose the high top. Our waitress showed up relatively quickly but as I said, it was very busy. 

On Sunday brunch is served and usually, I have breakfast here but today I decided to have a turkey club sandwich. Kasey had a chicken sandwich. I went with the homemade fries which are wonderful and Kasey opted for the greens which she also loved. 

My sandwich had carved turkey, cranberry mayo, bacon, melted Havarti cheese, and lettuce. It was delicious and I ate every bite. Kasey also cleaned her plate. She had a glass of Pino which she said was excellent. We were both delighted with our food and the general atmosphere. I have never been disappointed with my food here and we will be returning the next time we are in town for a show. 

The next time you are in Providence I highly recommend giving Bravo a try. 

Cape Ann Brewing Company, Gloucester, Ma.

Located on Rogers Street on the waterfront, the Cape Ann Brewing Company has a great location. A parking lot is located next door and if you are lucky, you will get a spot. This writer was not lucky and ended up parking in a bank parking lot down the street.

Several other parking lots are located in the area and with a further acquaintance with the neighborhood, this became quite evident. Seating is communal at this restaurant. If it is quiet, you will not need to share your table but if it gets busy, be prepared to make new friends.

The menu offers a wide selection of choices from the ever-present fried fish platters to sandwiches, salads, and appetizers. When asked what dishes no one should leave the brewery without having tasted, the waitress suggested the fish tacos and the steak bomb. 

These were promptly ordered along with stuffed clams and a Caprese salad appetizers.

Since the beer is brewed on site, there is a good selection of brews on offer and one of the seasonal ones was the Sunrise Saison. It has notes of strawberry and rhubarb and is certainly an appropriate choice for early summer. It is a light golden color and there certainly is a slightly fruity taste which is both delicious and refreshing. Don’t be afraid of the rhubarb, there were no sour overtones.

The stuffed clam appetizer included linguica in the stuffing. It was not as prominent as expected and the clams were okay but nothing special. The Caprese salad, on the other hand, was excellent with fresh tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, diced black olives and capers and balsamic reduction. The appetizer portions were not huge, there were four clams and five slices of tomato but there was enough to share.

The steak bomb is a huge portion. The roll was so overstuffed that it was awkward to try to pick up. There was loads of steak covered in melted cheese. In addition, the plate had a large portion of French fries, coleslaw, and a very delicious pickle. The fish tacos are also a very successful dish with a fried fish tender covered in salsa and corn and sitting on top of a portion of guacamole. The serving is two tacos and with the addition of French fries and coleslaw was more than enough to satisfy. The coating on the fish was light and there was aioli available to add any additional flavor that you need.

Cape Ann Brewing Company is the perfect place to come for a good time. The atmosphere is casual and the service was excellent. The noise level is quite high so not a good place for quiet conversation but for a great beer and a casual nosh, the location is ideal for enjoying the waterfront. The clientele was varied but families and children were mixed in with tourists and locals.