Christmas gift suggestions for cooks
- Scott Daniels: We Ate Well and Cheaply
- December 11, 2021
- 722
This doesn’t happen so much anymore, but there was a time when people would learn I loved to cook and they would give me gifts of things I didn’t want or need for my kitchen.
God bless them. They all had good hearts and the best of intentions, but owl-themed oven mitts, thin-walled pans and plastic tools aren’t all that useful. I have at least a dozen aprons, some plaid, some with ribald sayings and then the only one I ever use — plain white with pockets and a pen holder.
I hope you will accept my Christmas gift suggestions for the cooks in your life in the helpful spirit in which they are intended. All cooks do like to get useful things, and some of those things can be quite specific.
Measuring equipment, for example, starting with cups and spoons. I’ve had all kinds made of plastic, ceramic and metal, and while it may seem silly to spend a bit on measuring equipment when there’s so much inexpensive stuff out there, it’s not. Clear, plastic liquid measuring cups lose their markings rather quickly, get cloudy from runs through the dishwasher and can melt if left too close to a heat source. Get solid, clear glass ones in one, two, three and four cup volumes.
With dry measuring cups for flour, sugar and the like, plastic seems to break easily. Of the two or three sets I’ve had, they’ve all broken off their handles, and the only one left is a broke third cup measure that is now a cat-food scoop. Ceramic is OK but easily dropped. Here, you want solid-feeling metal cups. And metal is the thing for measuring spoons as well. Again, plastic and ceramic break easily. I don’t think three or four sets of measuring spoons is too many, as the one you need for salt is likely to have oil or milk on it.
Most of us, when baking, rely on weight rather than volume measures these days, and a good digital kitchen scale would be a welcome gift for a cook who doesn’t have one yet. The cheap, generic ones are garbage and fail fast, so look for well-known brands like Cuisinart or Kitchenaid.
Speaking of oven mitts, they’re probably something to toss and replace fairly frequently. They get gunked up fast, and once through the washing machine leaves them gnarled up and shrunken as a banker from a Harry Potter movie. In plain colors or better, black, they’re a safe gift.
Decorative spatulas, especially holiday-themed examples, are too pretty to use to melt up and ruin in careless common use. Plain, heat-resistant plastic ones in various sizes are the workhorses of any kitchen, as are hefty wooden spoons. Look for the kind your grandma used to have with big round bowls and sturdy handles and skip the variety pack at the big box store.
If you’re going to get a cookbook for a longtime cook, you have two routes: something specific or something old and interesting. General cookery by a celebrity chef might well be a snooze, but seeking out a detailed volume on mastering artisan bread baking might be better. If you run across an interesting-looking cookbook published before grandpa marched off to fight in Europe, that’s also a good bet. Bonus points if it’s in French.
Two things I’ve added to my collection of equipment this year have proven to be pretty useful. One is a citrus juicer that makes short work of juicing oranges, lemons and limes. I used to get those juices in bottles, but I can tell you fresh is genuinely better and makes a difference.
The other tool is a rice steamer, and I don’t know how we did without it. Both were snagged at great sales for less that $30.
Cooks are at once easy and hard to buy gifts for — easy because you have your category in place but hard because we tend to be picky snits about our stuff. I think these suggestions are pretty safe, even for the pickiest home cook.