We’ve all been there; stuck without a good holiday gift for one person, and you have no idea what to get them. You know they love food, but gift cards to the same chain restaurants are lame, and mugs stuffed with pre-packed hot cocoa just looks like you took the easy way out.
Need something for a chef? A dining-out enthusiast? A health nut? We’ve curated a great list of unique and local foodie gifts for everyone on your “Nice” list.
The foodie essentials
How about handmade American and exotic hardwood end grain cutting boards, crafted right here in Bucks County? Dead Horse Bay Arts creates these beautiful boards and one of a kind heirloom wooden boxes. Choose your favorite size and design here.
Gout et Voyage. Martine Bertin-Peterson offers hands-on classes to enhance basic cooking skills and to instill confidence in participants’ ability to recreate the dishes at home. Classes are individually scheduled and taught in her home or in your Bucks County home.
Give someone one of these cooking classes as a gift so they can learn how to create salads or sweets or sides. Maybe they’ll share what they learned in the form of a delicious meal. See more information on classes here. Martine also hosts amazing cooking trips to Provence, France. For more information and availability, click here.
Manoff Market Gardens knows how to make a special gift basket, and they are a perfect hostess gift or for a house gift when visiting family and friends. Some sets come with mugs and fresh jams, applesauce and bread, cheese and other local goodies. No need to toss a bunch of store-bought snacks together, these baskets have everything you need! See what’s available on their site.
Carversville Grocery Store has a charming selection of locally made gifts like fine art, jewelry, food items, toys, clothing, and wooden decor. They have a unique selection of hand carved spoons and cooking utensils made by Max Hansen himself. Get some goodies while you are there like chocolates, cheeses, jams, cookies, and more.
None Such Farm Market in Buckingham is a great place for gift baskets of their goods. While you are there, pick up some wine gifts from Buckingham Valley Vineyards for a festive bottle of port from the local winery.
Offbeat Gourmet sells its products in Doylestown’s Simply Fresh and Newtown’s Organnons Natural Market, which are just some of the local places where you’ll find their jams and marmalades, and savory spreads too. Create a basket of jams and spreads like red pepper jam, black currant jam, and Meyers lemon marmalade. Order online as well. See their shop for more details.
Pasqualina’s Italian Market & Deli is a place where you can find wonderful cheeses, chocolates, homemade pizzelles, house olive oils, and other Italian goodies that will make the perfect gift basket. Stop by their shop in Blooming Glen, PA.
Pierre’s Chocolates in New Hope has beautiful small batch chocolates, limited edition holiday truffles, dark chocolates, and new espresso meltaways made featuring finely ground coffee from Homestead Coffee Roasters in Black Eddy. Stop by their shop to see what’s available.
Shady Brook Farm and The Market at DelVal also carry gift baskets this time of year filled with local and gourmet items. Check out their websites for more information.
Tasting & Tours does the driving! This locally owned company offers tours of local wineries and breweries in Bucks County, Lehigh/Berks Counties and Cape May, NJ. Looking for a gift for that “hard to buy” person or a quick, thoughtful, last-minute gift for that relative you missed? Call 484.695.6465 for more information and see here for how to purchase gift certificates.
Give the gift of a great meal!
Golden Pheasant Inn in Erwinna has gift certificates for you to give your friends and family. Guests can enjoy the beauty and history of Bucks County while they enjoy fresh, natural, local ingredients with a seasonal menu. Order your gift certificates here.
Empanada Mama in Doylestown wants you to give the gift of tasty empanadas for the holiday season. Pick up one of their gift cards and give that coworker an excuse to treat themselves to something other than PB&J sandwiches for lunch.
Lumberville General Store in Lumberville is offering Gift Cards, redeemable at both the store and the Black Bass Hotel.
What do you get the foodie who has everything? More food!
Cheese. When we say cheese, we mean cheese. The authentic, rich, creamy, stinky, hard, cheeses you can find at your local farms. Pick up an elegant, yet inexpensive, cheese board with some of these cheeses, and you’ll have one happy foodie. Here’s what you’ll find at local Bucks County dairies:
Ely’s Farm in Upper Makefield is known for its meats, but its cheeses are just as good. Dwight Ely makes European style cheeses from raw cow’s milk aged over 60 days.
Choose from four kinds: Aldan’s Blessing, a trappist-style cheese made in the same way as the monasteries made cheese wheels for hundreds of years; Makefield, a savory, sophisticated and slightly sweet cheese, aged over 8 months and reminiscent of a Gruyere; Washington Crossing, sweet, creamy and hinting at Parmigiano; and the simple Ely Farm Cheese, mild, smooth and similar to Colby.
Ely’s cheese placed second in the United States at the American Cheese Society awards in 2012. Check out their products here.
Flint Hill Farm has pasteurized 60-day aged Jersey milk cheddar, and creamy spreadable cheeses. Their Jersey cows are milked every morning, and that’s the same exact milk used to make this cheese. Cows are pastured and unstressed. They have a mild cheddar and garlic and basil cheese if you want to have variety.
Fill the freezer with the gift of grass-fed beef!
Grass-fed beef is gaining in popularity and for good reason. It’s healthier, more sustainable and delicious. We have several posts explaining what’s the big deal with grass-fed beef here. Below, check out some farms that have different cuts of meat, perfect for the foodie that loves to grill and cook!
Birchwood Farm in Newtown is known for its grain-free beef. They say that a steak from an animal with a heavy grain diet will have an omega ratio of 20:1, whereas a steak from a grass-finished animal will have an omega ratio of 1:1.15. The farm also uses Devon cattle on a strictly grass and hay diet only.
Other farms to check out include Springtown’s Meadow Brook Farms (beef) and Purely Farm (pork) in Ottsville, or Tussock Sedge Farm (beef) in Blooming Glen. You can buy a sampler pack from Tussock Sedge Farm that includes a total of 12 lbs. of meat: 3 assorted steaks, 1 roast, 1 lb. of cube/stew meat, 5 lbs. ground beef and 1 lb. chipped steak. If you really love the person, buy an eighth of a cow for $369 (46-47 lbs.). It will get them through the winter for sure. Tussock Sedge is open Saturdays from 10 am to 2 pm. See their website for purchasing details.
None Such Farm Market in Buckingham has a meat shop and deli where they sell their 100% non-GMO fed beef. The steer are fed corn, barley, hay and corn silage that is grown right on the farm and are pastured most of the year. They also have a full service deli featuring Boars Head Meat’s and Cheeses. Check out the shop here.
Need more meat? Take a foodie road trip this holiday to Meat Alley, a term we coined to describe the stretch of butchers and farms in Bucks County. Read the post here and let us know your favorite local butcher!
As always, if we’ve left out someone you feel deserves mention, feel free to comment below or contact us at info@buckscountytaste.com.
