There are plenty of solid gift ideas for the home cook in your life, like a fancy cookbook or a brand-new kitchen gadget, but if you really want to wow them, consider gifting a little bundle of cooking gear for the holidays. And if you want to go the extra mile, make it themed: a rolling pin, parchment paper, and a Dorie Greenspan book for a baker, for instance, or a spiralizer, a Magic Bullet, and a Yonanas frozen yogurt maker for a health nut. To help take the work out of such DIY gift baskets, we’ve concocted 11 gift bundles for every type of home cook in your life, all of which are under $100 but will seem a lot more expensive (and a little more thoughtful).
For the coffee lover
Total: $90
It’s hard to say if the highlight of this bundle is the shiny new pour-over kettle from Fellow (which has become a perennial Strategist holiday favorite) or the coffee beans from Blue Bottle, sold in an airtight metal canister that preserves their freshness longer than a bag. Add in a little metal measuring spoon for grounds to really upgrade their coffee-making setup.
For the carb-obsessed
Total: $90
This Marcato Atlas pasta machine is an essential pasta-making tool, according to professional pasta-maker Linda Miller Nicholson, as is a bench scraper, for wrangling homemade dough. Pair it with a cookbook by Missy Robbins, the James Beard Award-winning chef whose newest restaurant Misi features a whole room devoted to pasta-making (and caused a whole lot of buzz this year).
For the wannabe Great British Baking Show contestant
Total: $90
A new set of stacking, stainless steel mixing bowls to replace the hodgepodge of bowls and colanders that are probably taking up all of their cupboard space, plus a proper cake tester — a more delicate way to make sure a cake is done than with a butter-knife — and a new baking cookbook with 100 well-illustrated recipes from Rose Levy Beranbaum, will be sure to have them stoked about baking long after holiday cookie season ends.
For the aspiring bartender
Total: $87
This black and gold cocktail shaker set, paired with a set of coupe glasses and an easy-to-follow book of one-bottle cocktail recipes, would be a nice addition to anyone’s bar cart.
For the at-home pitmaster
Total: $79
This bundle for a barbecue enthusiast features two extremely practical gifts — specifically, an accurate, barbecue-friendly thermometer to make sure everything’s cooked through, and a heavy-duty pair of pit gloves to pick up even the hottest meat — as well as one that’s more whimsical (although pitmaster-approved): a beer can chicken roaster rack.
For the home baker who’s finally going to master the art of making pie crusts
Total: $38
Lisa Ludwinski’s cookbook Sister Pie, which features recipes straight from her Detroit bakery, has been heralded as one of the best cookbooks of 2018, with an easy-to-follow pie crust recipe and plenty of seasonal flavor combinations. To make these recipes even easier for your baker-to-be, make sure they have all the gear they might need by pairing the book with a silicone dough rolling bag and a pastry blender.
For the mad scientist
Total: $50
Noma’s head of fermentation, David Zilber, has plenty of tips and tricks for those who want to ferment vegetables at home, almost all of which are included, in beautifully illustrated detail, in his cookbook, which is co-authored with Noma chef and co-owner René Redzepi. Gift some airlock fermentation lids and glass weights so that your mad scientist-slash-home cook can get fermenting straight away.
For the home cook channeling Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat
Total: $101
We went on a hunt for the mid-century enamel Dutch oven featured in Netflix’s Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat and figured out, pretty quickly, that it’s a Dansk Kobenstyle. And even though it pushes us just slightly over our $100 budget, this handsome Dutch oven is a gift that’ll last — and is sure to please any fan of the show when you pair it with the cookbook that inspired it all.
For the person who eats ice cream even when it’s snowing
Total: $88
Jeni Britton Bauer, founder of Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams, walked us through the essential tools for making ice cream at home, and for under $100, you can gift a high-quality ice cream maker, along with an extra canister and an ice cream scoop that’s so well-designed, it’s on display at MoMA.
For the person who’s sworn off plastic straws
Total: $73
Now that they’ve stopped using disposable plastic straws and stocked up on metal ones, give the gift of everything they’ll need to pack an eco-friendly lunch, including reusable food wrap to replace plastic wrap, a set of stainless steel cutlery, and a stylish, ceramic to-go bowl (which is on the wish list of editors from both the Cut and Grub Street).
For the tea drinker
Total: $87
New York City’s Cha Cha Matcha now sells its ceremonial-grade matcha powder online. Pair it with a Japanese ceramic mug and a little matcha whisk, and they’ll have everything they need to make café-quality matcha in their own kitchen.
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