THE MOST BEAUTIFUL DELICIOUS GIFTS
We love giving and receiving beautiful edible gifts during holiday time -- or really any time. If you do too (who doesn’t???), you’ll want to check out the collection of lovely suggestions curated-for-beauty by the BeautifulNow team.
There are extra-special cookbooks, including from our friends at Food52, plus new discoveries from food bloggers Jerrelle Guy, of Chocolate for Basil and Athena Calderone, of EyeSwoon. There are beyond-beautiful chocolates from Marco Colazani’s Amaro and Fritz Knipschildt. There’s an innovative kitchen gadget from Nomiku that’s bound to become a daily go-to. And a gift to give back to Edible Schoolyard.
In fact, if you are a foodie too, you might want to add all of these to your gift-one and get-one-for-yourself dual purpose gift lists. Or maybe gild the lily by baking something scrumptious from the cookbooks and gifting with the cookbooks!
Check out these extraordinary delicious gifts below.
Food blogger & baker extraordinaire Jerrelle Guy explores the many connections between baking and memory in her sumptuous new cookbook, “Black Girl Baking: Wholesome Recipes Inspired by a Soulful Upbringing.”
Each recipe tells a story. Orange Peel Pound Cake brings back memories of summer days eating Florida oranges at Big Ma’s house, Rosketti cookies reimagine the treats her mother ate growing up in Guam, and Plaited Dukkah Bread parallels the braids worked into her hair as a child. “Strawberry Butter Rose Buns are sweet therapy,”advises the reviewers at Modern Loss.
Jerrelle Guy, founder of the popular food blog Chocolate for Basil, is also an award-winning food photographer, so the photos are spectacular. She has been featured in Vogue, The Boston Globe, Food52 and more.
“Cook Beautiful,” by Athena Calderone, creator of EyeSwoon, is a gorgeous gift for any home chef, with 100 seasonal recipes for meals as gorgeous as they are delicious.
Calderone offers brilliant ideas and advice for the most beautiful prep and presentation. You can see even more of her eye-candied magic on EyeSwoon, an online lifestyle destination for food, entertaining, fashion, and interior design, where she cooks with top chefs, hosts incredible dinners, and designs stunning tablescapes
Recipes include Grilled Zucchini Flatbread with Ramp-Pistachio Pesto, Charred Eggplant with Zaatar and Yogurt Tahini, Mezzi Rigatoni with Radicchio and Guanciale, Stewed Pork with Squash and Walnut Gremolata, Blood Orange Bundt Cake with Orange Bitters Glaze, and more.
Organized by season, each section closes with a tablescape inspired by nature, along with specific table décor and entertaining tips.
“In Cook Beautiful, Athena Calderone unites her twin passions of cooking and styling. Her glorious food takes on a magnificent, almost otherworldly, loveliness through an extraordinary use of color, shape, and texture. After studying every picture, I’m ready to replicate it myself!”
-- Dana Cowin journalist and former editor in chief of Food & Wine
Harry N. Abrams, publisher.
“Food52 Genius Desserts,” by Kristen Miglore. Courtesy of Ten Speed Press.
“Food52 Genius Desserts: 100 Recipes That Will Change the Way You Bake,” by Kristen Miglore,
is an IACP award-winning, New York Times best-selling cookbook that truly is “genius!”
Featured as one of the best and most anticipated fall cookbooks by the New York Times, Eater, Epicurious, The Kitchn, Kitchen Arts & Letters, Delish, Mercury News, Sweet Paul, and PopSugar.
Miglore collected the smartest, most beautiful recipes from a diverse range of cookbook authors, chefs, and bakers, including classics, like Maida Heatter’s East 62nd Street Lemon Cake, François Payard’s Flourless Chocolate-Walnut Cookies, and Nancy Silverton’s Butterscotch Budino as well as some super-creative ideas, like Peach Cobbler with Hot Sugar Crust from Renee Erickson and Parsnip Cake with Blood Orange Buttercream from Lucky Peach.
We’re longtime fans of the book’s photographer James Ransom. The images are magnificent and inspiring.
Fritz Knipschildt, of House of Knipschildt, a Connecticut chocolatier, offers up sumptuous truffles with a spicy mulled wine filling. Glossed with dark chocolate and red and white coatings, these beauties with make your loved ones say “aahhhh” when they open the box… then "mmmmmmn" when they taste.
Available at Dean & DeLuca.
All high quality chocolate bars have some beauty, but Amaro Chocolate Bricks, made in Italy by award-winning chocolatier Marco Colzani, might just take the cake! Made with single-origin Ivory Coast cacao beans, these giant chocolate bars come topped with paper thin slices of dried Sicilian orange or strawberries, or a plethora of premium roasted nuts.
Available at Gustiamo.
Give the gift of good food in a high tech flash with Nomiku Sous Chef, the personal sous vide immersion circulator. This smart personal sous vide cooker cooks vacuum-packed foods in a temperature-controlled water bath, just like professional chefs do, except this one is compact and controlled via WIFI by your smartphone. It comes with a food program that sends you delicious precooked frozen meals, so it couldn’t be easier or more convenient.
Simply wave the RFID label on the food package over the front of the machine and it will automatically detect what meal it is. Then immerse it in a pot of water and the heating algorithm will kick in, perfectly adjusting the temperature, to deliver a perfect meal in just 30 minutes. No muss. No fuss.
"This is the way Michelin star chefs heat up their food," says Nomiku founder Lisa Q. Fetterman. It’s “Food Tech for People Who Love to Eat.”
The meals can be tailored to a variety of dietary preferences, like vegan, gluten-free and paleo. Some sample menu items include sweet potato grits, chickpea masala and pork shoulder with chipotle.
Another cool feature: the machine keeps track of your inventory with the RFID scans, so it can automatically replenish your default order once you're down to your last four packages of food.
All Nomiku recipes are prepared with sustainably-sourced proteins and farm fresh ingredients. The protein is from free-range, free-roaming animals raised with no hormones and no antibiotics. Nomiku uses only minimally processed, natural ingredients with no added color.
Give Nomiku.
While you’re in the mood for giving food gifts, you might want to give back.
Over 94% of children don’t eat enough vegetables. Founded by award-winning iconic chef & food activist Alice Waters, The Edible Schoolyard’s mission is to support edible education for every child. They partner with public schools to cultivate healthy students and communities through hands-on cooking and gardening education, transforming children’s relationship with food.
Donate to The Edible Schoolyard to help give children a nourishing education that will serve them throughout their lives.
Donate to Edible Schoolyard NYC by January 3 and Northwestern Mutual will match your gift up to $10,000.
Your gift will help to support edible education for all of New York City's 1.1 million public school children.
BN DAILY FIX Story written by Shira White
Read more about Beautiful Gifts all this week on BeautifulNow, including The Most Beautiful Travel Gifts, The Most Beautiful Wellness Gifts, These Gifts Make a Beautiful Difference, These Gifts Do a World of Good and The Most Beautiful Gift in the World. And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Wellness, Impact, Nature/Science, Food, Arts/Design, and Travel, Daily Fix posts.
Want more stories like this? Sign up for our weekly BN Newsletter, Like us on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest. Join our BeautifulNow Community and connect with the most beautiful things happening in the world right now!
Do you have amazing photos? Enter them in this week’s BN Photo Competition.
