Holiday Gift Guide 2025

Friends, hello! Below you will find a collection of gift ideas ranging from new cookbooks to delicious almond butter to exceptional flour to cheerful socks and more. If you have any items you are excited about gifting this year, please share them in the comments — I love hearing them!

My perennial favorite kitchen (and other) items can be found in The Shop. And at the very end of the post, I’ve included my favorite local and online retailers.

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Gift Guide 2025

A Pizza Making Class (with Me! in Philly!)

On January 8th, I’ll be teaching a teaching a pizza making class at The Bread Room, a bakery and event space created by Fork’s Ellen Yin in Center City. We’ll start the evening with snacks from The Bread Room and a beverage, then we’ll start making dough, shaping dough rounds, and baking. After baking, we’ll enjoy our pizzas with a fresh salad and dessert from The Bread Room kitchen. More details here: Pizza Night at The Bread Room

Cast Iron Chris Chainmail + Compound

For your friend who hates plastic/nonstick anything and has embraced cast iron: a Cast Iron Chris Seasoning Compound/Chainmail Combo, which includes a chainmail scrubber and 1 tub of seasoning/maintenance compound. Watch videos on how to use the chainmail scrubber here and the compound here. One of you (hi Carrie!) introduced me to Cast Iron Chris, and my cast iron skillets have all received a lot more TLC since.

For that same friend who also loves wine, a paper wine tote, perhaps filled with a nice bottle of wine. There are some people who are impossible to shop for, but I feel like you can never go wrong with a nice bottle of wine, which the recipient could drink or re-gift. A funl tote makes it all the more special.

Bombas slipper booties. These are so cozy. I have been bringing them to friends’ houses when I visit, because they look cute with anything from nice jeans to tights to joggers:

House of Shan Socks: Shortie Socks or Imperfect Heart Socks My friend Shannon’s company House of Shan sells the most uplifting/cheerful items, and a portion of every purchase goes to charity. In the past 5 years, the company has raised over $250,000 for charities. The socks look so cute with hightops or little booties. My kids love them, too. Use code ALICOOKS20 for 20% off the site 🎉

Beaverkill Bourbon Cream Made from cream from farms in the Finger Lakes, Hudson Valley maple syrup, and New York Bourbon, this bourbon cream is outrageously delicious. Splash it into coffee or hot chocolate, pour it over ice cream, or serve it on the rocks — it is so, so tasty. Local friends, you can find it at the Niskayuna Wine Store. Also available online: Beaverkill Bourbon Cream

For the chocolate lover in your life, especially delicious Dubai chocolate. My son asked for Dubai chocolate for his birthday this year, and my mother, researcher that she is, found a very nice block to gift him: Laderach Dubai chocolate. Given that it is made with milk chocolate (as opposed to dark), I did not think I was going to care for it, but it more than lived up to the hype — it is so, so good. Broken into shards, it’s very pretty, too.

For your friend that has everything, a nice bottle of olive oil — everyone can use more good olive oil. I learned about Piro extra-virgin olive oil from my friend Ali Rosen, who’s next book, The Slow Burn (out in 2026), takes place in Italy. It is so very tasty.

You could pair it with a nice bottle of vinegar: Vivo red wine vinegar has ruined all others for me — when I use it in this Greek salad dressing recipe, it never tastes better. From the makers: “Every bottle is small-batch crafted in Italy using only Lambrusco grapes from Emilia-Romagna. The result is vinegar so bright and balanced, you could drink it straight.” It’s true!

Corto x Stanislaus Chef’s Essentials Kit: I shared this kit in this year’s Father’s Day gift guide, but had to re-share it, because the tomatoes are truly so delicious. You can find the tomatoes on Milk Street as well. Puréed with a little bit of olive oil and flaky sea salt, it makes one tasty, fresh pizza sauce. Corto olive oil is also excellent.

For the sourdough bread baker in your life, a Live Laugh Loaf flour sack towel, made by the brilliant graphic designer Lindsay Landis of Purr and Love and Olive Oil, who has recently created a whole collection of “fresh baked puns.” You could pair it with one of Wordloaf’s sourdough starter whisks, which you will not be able to live without once you start using it.

For the pizza lover in your life, Rosi’s Hot Oil — how fun is this tin?

You could pair it with a copy of Pizza Night. Now Serving in Los Angeles has signed copies of both Pizza Night and Bread Toast Crumbs, and they ship everywhere, including internationally.

Big Spoon Pistachio Crunch: My mother introduced me to this exceptionally delicious almond butter. I love spreading it over bananas or dates. You could pair it with a box of delicious dates.

An assortment of Fishwife Tinned Fish: These are my favorites: Smoked Salmon Sichuan Chili Crisp, Smoked Rainbow Trout, Mackerel, and…

… the anchovies! For your Caesar salad-loving friend, these anchovies truly are extraordinary. I eat them straight from the tin.

Really interesting flour: Petra 0103. My mother ordered this by accident and decided to make the peasant bread with it, using honey in place of the sugar. She gave me a loaf, and my family devoured it. I ordered a bag of it right away. It’s a mix of partially sprouted wheat flour, sprouted rice flour and wholemeal sprouted barley flour. I love the dark hue it tinges the bread…

And the crumb is so chewy and the flavor so lovely:

You could pair it with a copy of Bread Toast Crumbs (thank you!) and…

Some good butter (I can find this one at Whole Foods) and a nice butter spreader:

Cookbooks!

For your vegetarian friend looking to up her salad game, Hetty McKinnon’s Linger:

… you could pair it with a Guatemalan bean spoon:

For your Salt Fat Acid Heat loving friend, Samin’s latest: Good Things

For any young, adventurous, budget-conscious cook in your life, Rosie Kellett’s In For Dinner:

For the entertainer/host or hostess in your life, Ben and Zikki Siman-Tov’s Eat Small Plates

For kids, a few ideas:

Personalized Stationery from Minted, to make writing thank you notes a little less painful:

Delicious hot chocolate: Silly Cow hot cocoa from Vermont is so, so tasty. Local Friends, you can find this at the Niskayuna Co-op.

A sushi making cookbook + kit. I got this for my son, who loves sushi, for Christmas last year, and he has since treated the family to homemade sushi at least half a dozen times. It is such a treat:

A Few More Things

Like many, I loved Heart the Lover … had to stifle sobs while reading it on Amtrack on my way home from NYC one day this fall.

An All the Restaurants print. I wrote about this last Christmas, and I have a few framed in my house, including Fork, Balthazar, and Tria.

A nice sweater. I love this one from Sezane:

A physical copy of The Onion. The news is dreadful. The Onion will make you laugh. After an 11-year break, the onion is back in print, and you can now get a copy delivered to your door every month.

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In addition to the items above, a gift certificate to a local shop or restaurant, such as The Vischer Ferry General Store or Arthur’s Market or The Broken Inn would make a great gift. Here are some local and online shops I love:

Local Shops

And here are some online shops I return to again and again:

Online Shops