The Vittles Christmas Gift Guide 2023
3kg of kimchi, Scampi Fries signet ring, a wormery, a cheese gown, and 100 more gift ideas
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The paradox of buying gifts for anyone with a hobby is that the more niche the hobby, the easier it is to think of a gift and the harder it is to come up with something that the person actually wants. Add into the mix that food shops love to bamboozle gift-givers with things over the Christmas period that they know wouldn’t sell any other time of year, and you have a dilemma: what to get for the food-obsessed person in your life to show you really understand them? The risk is always trying to go big but misinterpreting what they are likely to use — for example, people think I’m hard to buy presents for, but if you got me a case of Perrier Water and a large bar of Galaxy Caramel, I would eat out of your lap for a month.
In this spirit, it’s time again for the Vittles Christmas Gift Guide, the closest thing we have to an annual tradition. I wrote the first guide back in 2020, our columnists wrote it in 2021, and our contributors wrote in in 2022. All of these guides are still relevant, so if you’re stuck for ideas, feel free to peruse them again. Otherwise, we have a hundred or so more ideas for you here: from Serious Practical Things, to Stocking Condiments, to the most important section, Small Frivolous Things. The joy of giving a gift is to put a smile on someone’s face and let them know that you are as stupid as they are. That is why, as usual, I will be gifting everyone second hand copies of Jamie Oliver’s turn of the millennium masterpiece Cookin’: Music to Cook By. I hope you find something equally stupid too. JN
Note: If this very long email cuts off, this guide is best read in full on our website.
Author Key
AH- Angela Hui
AK – Amy Key
AKK – Adrienne Katz Kennedy
ASM – Anna Sulan Masing
EC – Ed Cumming
FG – Feroz Gajia
GC – Gavin Cleaver
HH – Hester van Hensbergen
IR – Isaac Rangaswami
JaH – James Hansen
JoH – Joel Hart
JN – Jonathan Nunn
JR – Jago Rackham
KB – K Biswas
LD – Lucy Dearlove
LK – Lily Kelting
MA – Montague Ashley-Craig
ME – Melek Erdal
MPS – Molly Pepper Steemson
MT – Melissa Thompson
MY – Mehrunnisa Yusuf
NB – Nick Bramham
PH – Phin Harper
RA – Robbie Armstrong
RMJ – Rebecca May Johnson
RP – Riaz Phillips
SD – Sharanya Deepak
SI – Saba Imtiaz
SL – Sing Yun Lee
YA – Yemisi Aribisala
Small Frivolous Things
This is the kind of item that should only exist in a child’s play kitchen, but luckily it is made for adults. Frankly, there should be more fun, toy-like items in kitchens. Amid a sea of luminous Le Creuset pans and chopping boards that could double as fire logs the earnestness of these monster colanders/ strainer (£14.99) is refreshing – and even better, they’re terribly practical. SI
I am a long-time admirer of the brassica-inspired lighting of Glasgow-based Urpflanze – and its Instagram is a pleasing place to look at images of other cabbage-led designs ( you can submit entries for them to post). I particularly like the ‘Eat Up Mini’ (from £55), made from a solid piece of frosted acrylic in a choice of green shades – savoy, napa or cannonball, naturally – and which comes either as a hanging light or as a version that can sit on a table. RMJ
Socks are a wonderful gift. A novelty sweater can have its charms, but how many days can you really make a ‘ho ho ho’ sweater work? The patterns of these ‘spicy’ themed socks (£30) by London Sock Exchange – tacos, sauce, a resplendent red chilli pepper – are just subtle enough to move away from the gag gift category and become rather wearable. SI
I really need to stop being a magpie who’s drawn to dumb, cute things, but how can you resist the baby Tatung steamer for only £18? Taiwan’s famed multifunctional steamer now comes in miniature stainless steel pot form, which you can buy from Yun Hai, a great little Taiwanese pantry in New York. Yun Hai also stocks some genuinely useful and unique kitchen bits you won’t find elsewhere like the steamer tongs (goodbye struggling to pick up hot plates with a tea towel), firewood soy paste and dried mushrooms. There are loads of cooking gift bundles too. AH
During the pandemic, the environmentally conscious hospitality legend Magali Bellego began fashioning candles out of used wine bottles, breathing new life into evocative, often coveted objects, which carry and bring joy to a great many people only to be tossed in the trash once empty. Filled with elegantly perfumed sustainable wax and a wooden wick that crackles and pops as it gently burns like a miniature log fire, there's a remarkably broad selection and she even offers custom orders - it could be a special bottle you once shared during a magical evening with pals; that ‘unicorn’ your beloved scored in a Lyonnaise cave à vin; or it might just have a really cool label. NB
Candles are usually well-meaning Christmas gifts for people you don’t know well yet, but plan on liking from a safe distance in the future. This year you should have the courage to surprise a neutral acquaintance with a highly specific version of an otherwise diplomatic present in the form of a delectable faux food candle from Choosing Keeping. At the time of writing you could gently bewilder your sibling’s new girlfriend’s mum with a candle lovingly hand-crafted as a Banana Split (£40), a plate of Spaghetti Bolognese (£85), or a Hot Dog (£40) served, inexplicably, in a pair on a French baguette. Buon appetito. SL
If you thought the world’s biggest soft drinks company made Santa red and white, think again, As the real ones know, Father Christmas’s trademark colourway – as well as his peregrinations with a herd of gravity-defying reindeer – probably have their origins in the entheogenic journeys of Sámi shaman, who have long ingested the distinctive fly agaric mushroom; even the Sápmi reindeer get absolutely off their antlers on them. While I wouldn’t advise consuming amanita muscaria over the festive period, why not celebrate the trippy roots of Christmas by giving a cute mushroom bauble (from £17.50) to your loved one to release their inner shaman? Gifting options abound on Etsy, or you could pick up a wee smiley woollen one like this £4 guy to stick in someone’s stocking. RA
In the Netherlands, where I currently live, cosmopolitan bougies have been dubbed the havermelk elite, as the journalist Jonas Kooyman puts it, because of their penchant for oat milk, yoga and podcasts. But at least everyone is in on the joke of just how hard it is to get that lifestyle. Why not go for full-on irony with an Oatly box-inspired ornament for £14? The antithesis to this is an earnest fries ornament (£14.80), replete with a glob of mayo. In The Netherlands, fries are ubiquitous and mayo is the default condiment of choice. As someone from a ketchup/chilli-garlic sauce-forward country, the idea that mayo could be a preferred dip seemed odd at first, but after a year of living here, I’m a convert. SI
3kg of kimchi from H Mart
Have you seen the price of kimchi in central London? It’s completely insane. If you have a loved one who appreciates kimchi, eccentric gifting and thriftiness, you cannot go wrong with three entire kilograms of kimchi for £25.99 from New Malden’s massively underappreciated H Mart. GC