Impress your loved ones with homemade food gifts that are both delicious and easy to make. Our guide offers a variety of recipes, from classic to creative, to inspire your holiday gifting.

The complete guide to food gifts for the holidays

Regarding gifting during the holidays, there’s little that money can’t buy. However, if you’re working with a limited budget this season, a visit to the grocery store and a little time in the kitchen can produce a remarkable stack of food gifts for a lower cost.

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DIY edible gifts are not only cost-effective; they are sincere presents crafted with love (or, at least, that’s the perception your loved ones will have). With the right recipes at your disposal, they will also be much more unique and flavourful than those purchased from the store. If you have a touch of creativity, a roll of ribbon and some time spent hand-decorating labels can turn even the dullest condiments, such as mayonnaise or barbecue sauce, into delightful gifts.

Continue reading for our top simple-to-create, easy-to-give favourites that delight everyone—ranging from zesty, tangy olive tapenades to DIY chili mixes. To create a more impressive gift, simply prepare several of these recipes in large quantities, divide them into Ball jars or cellophane bags, place them in a tissue-paper-lined wicker basket, and start the giving!

Before we start here is a gift pack that you can add to any of the homemade gift ideas we will mention later.

Two Rivers Coffee Company’s Santa’s Favorites gift package

This festive season, Two Rivers Coffee Company invites you to snuggle in and enjoy the holiday tastes of their Santa’s Favorites gift pack, a cheerful exclusive sampler assortment that beautifully embodies the warmth and happiness of the season.

This sampler is crafted with a delightful combination of flavoured coffee and rich hot cocoa, intended to enhance each holiday moment with additional magic. Each cup is crafted to embody the magic of the season, ranging from invigorating mint to sweet spices.

Elegantly presented in a cheerful holiday box for less than US$30.00, Santa’s Favorites gift pack by Two Rivers Coffee Company creates an ideal present for stockings, gift exchanges, or a festive indulgence for yourself to prepare each sip brings joy and light.

Sweet TnT Short Stories

Life in Trinidad and Tobago comes alive in the exciting, entertaining, comical, dramatic, thrilling, mysterious and suspenseful tales in Sweet TnT Short Stories. The novella consists of 34 fictional pieces written by authors from around the twin islands who share narratives with you under the sections Lifestyle, Superstition and Fauna. Created by Culturama Publishing Company, producer of Sweet TnT Magazine from San Juan, Trinidad and Tobago, this book is one of the publications that commemorates the 10th anniversary of the publisher from 2009-2019.

Kindle edition US$4.99

Paperback edition US$9.99

Elevate your holiday giving: Gourmet food gifts you can make

Olive Tapenade

Tapenade, as many of us are familiar with, is a purée rich in olives, usually enhanced with garlic, anchovies, and fresh herbs. However, the classic tapenade, invented by a chef in Marseille in 1880, derives its name from tapeno, which is the Provençal term for capers and is seasoned accordingly.

Combining equal measures of olives, capers, and fish (anchovies and tuna in this instance), it’s salty and robust, while fresh herbs, Dijon mustard, and a dash of cognac add even more depth of flavour. It’s not suited for all tastes but it’s a gift that is sure to delight and astonish more daring eaters.

Homemade Carr’s-Style Crackers

These whole grain crackers are remarkably adaptable—thin enough to complement delicate appetisers, yet robust enough to enjoy on their own, and well matched with both sweet and salty pairings.

They would serve as a delightful gift by themselves—possibly wrapped in cellophane—but they also complement any of the homemade spreads and dips featured here, such as rillettes or olive tapenade.

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Marinated Goat Cheese

If you’re pressed for time or unsure of your cooking skills, this is the perfect project for you. Purchase fresh goat cheese, cut it into serving sizes (or form it into balls), and soak it in jars with olive oil, garlic, lemon peel, bay leaves, and thyme.

Within a few hours, that simple store-bought cheese will be enriched with herbal, citrus notes—a significant enhancement, needing almost no effort at all. The cheese needs to be eaten within a week, ensure to tell your recipient to eat it as soon as possible.

Homemade Pickles

Similar to marinated goat cheese, pickles represent a simple yet rewarding venture. However, it is important to emphasise that one of the key elements in this process is time—you’ll need to allow yourself a minimum of three weeks for these products to ferment.

The Milwaukee-style cucumber pickles are boiled with vinegar, sugar, and spices before being jarred with garlic, onion, and dill to soak in brine for several weeks.

For a tangier pickle, try lacto-fermented dill pickles instead. A saline brine creates ideal circumstances for lactobacillus bacteria. You can prepare half-sours in only three weeks, or opt for a longer fermentation duration (approximately six weeks) if you desire full-sours.

If the person you’re gifting to doesn’t like cucumbers, or if you want a fresh project, making homemade sauerkraut is an incredibly enjoyable task, and ideal for the sausage or hot dog enthusiast in your life.

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Sweet TnT 100 West Indian Recipes

Sweet TnT 100 West Indian Recipes is your kitchen guide to cooking in the Caribbean. Add flavour to your pot and put a smile on everyone’s faces with the right amount of seasonings, spices and stories about the foods you prepare. This cookbook contains 100 tantalising recipes and full colour photographs of home-cooked meals, street foods, treats and drinks that are known in the West Indies for having particular names, ingredients and preparations.

Kindle Edition US$4.99

Paperback US$29.99

Oven-Dried Grapes (aka raisins)

Alright, it’s true that “homemade raisins” may not seem like the most exciting gift, but these juicy, plump treats could pleasantly surprise you. Dehydrating grapes in a low-temperature oven maintains their fresh taste and results in a softer texture—they will be dry enough to keep for weeks, but significantly less tough and wrinkled than those purchased in stores.

Additionally, this technique enables you to combine different grape types for a more thrilling variety of colours and tastes.

Salmon Rillettes

With their refined French title and polished French flavour, salmon rillettes will give your recipient a sense of luxury—and persuade them that you are also upscale. Truthfully, the sole aspect that isn’t sophisticated about rillettes is their simplicity in preparation.

The spreadable appetiser consists of lightly poached and shredded salmon, mixed with fresh herbs, mayonnaise, and lemon juice.

Not a lover of salmon? A version made with pork presents a somewhat richer rillette. Both variations can be preserved and presented in small Ball jars, making them an ideal complement to a cheese and meat board, served alongside cornichons and toast or crackers.

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Homemade Spicy Chili Crisp

Chili crisp tastes great on nearly any food. You can put it on eggs, meat, and smother it on pepperoni pizza. Sichuan peppercorns give the sauce its signature numbing sensation, while crispy shallots and garlic chips, along with peanuts, enhance both the flavour and texture.

Your friends and family will be asking for more well before the next holiday arrives.

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