29 Best Gifts for Foodies Who Love to Eat Well

Most foodies own one fancy salt. This box gives them six, and the fun is in tasting them on the same slice of tomato or buttered radish: the crunchy Cyprus pyramids, the damp minerality of French grey, the clean Sicilian. It is a small, cheap gift that changes how they finish a plate.

Anyone who has eaten real balsamic in Italy knows the watery bottle at the supermarket is a different product. This barrel-aged Modena vinegar is thick enough to drizzle in a thin ribbon over aged parmesan, ripe strawberries or a scoop of vanilla gelato, the way the people who love food actually want to use it.

Olive oil has terroir just like wine, and this box proves it. Five single-cultivar Italian oils, from the green-tomato notes of Ravece to the peppery bite of Nocellara, turn a loaf of crusty bread into a proper tasting. Lay out five small plates and it becomes a dinner-party activity.

Saffron is the spice foodies most often buy cheap and regret. These are Super Negin threads, the long, all-red grade, lab tested so there is no filler. For the friend who makes paella, risotto alla milanese or Persian tahdig, a tin of the good stuff is a gift that shows up in every dish.

Truffle is the flavor food lovers chase on restaurant menus, and this tub brings it home without the price of a fresh truffle. Fourteen ounces of Italian sea salt with black truffle essence will last through months of popcorn, fries and Sunday scrambled eggs.

Six small-batch blends, each built around a different cuisine, in magnetic tins that live on the fridge door where they actually get used. It is a gentle push out of the weeknight rut for a foodie who cooks as much as they eat out.

Café matcha is often the cheap culinary grade blended with sugar. Ceremonial grade whisked with hot water is something else: grassy, sweet and smooth. This tin makes about 30 traditional bowls, a lovely introduction for a curious foodie or a top-up for one who already has the whisk.

If a foodie on your list does not own a jar of chili crisp yet, fix that. FLYBYJING's Chengdu-style version is crunchy with fried garlic and shallot and buzzing with Sichuan pepper, and it goes on everything from fried eggs to dumplings to vanilla ice cream. At under $20 it is our favorite small gift on the list.

Truffle hot sauce sounds like a gimmick until you taste it. TRUFF balances ripe chili with real black truffle and a little agave, so it reads earthy rather than just hot. The two-bottle set lets them try the original and the punchier habanero on pizza, mac and cheese or a steak.

Hot honey went from Brooklyn pizzerias to every menu in the country, and Mike's is the one that started it. Two bottles mean one for the kitchen and one for the cheese board. Drizzle it on fried chicken, burrata or roasted carrots and dinner is suddenly a restaurant dish.

Most people think honey tastes like honey. Put sourwood, wildflower and orange blossom side by side and the differences are as clear as between wines. This set is perfect for the foodie who builds cheese boards, sweetens tea carefully or simply loves a tasting.

Furikake is Japan's everyday seasoning, and eight flavors in one box, from salmon and shiso to wasabi and bonito, is a tour few Western kitchens get. A shake on rice, avocado toast or popcorn makes it a gift they will reach for daily.

For the foodie who cares as much about the drink before dinner as the meal itself. Four small-batch bitters (aromatic, orange, cherry and black walnut) are the secret to an Old Fashioned or Manhattan that tastes like a cocktail bar made it. The dasher bottles make about 32 drinks.

Tinned fish is having a moment, and Fishwife is the brand food people talk about. The set covers anchovies, sardines, albacore, mackerel and smoked trout, all sustainably caught and packed at a Spanish cannery that dates to 1869. Add bread, butter and lemon and it is an instant date-night board.

Four salami, four genuinely different flavors: classic garlic and ginger, chipotle and cocoa, orange cardamom and fennel-heavy finocchiona. It makes a ready-made charcuterie board for the foodie who hosts, and it travels well as a host gift.

For the foodie who has everything, a whole leg of Spanish serrano ham is the splurge that becomes a household ritual. It is cured in Girona with nothing but sea salt, arrives with a stand and carving knife, and keeps for months on the counter, so every guest gets a few paper-thin slices.

A good cheese board needs the right knives: a soft-cheese blade that does not stick, a pronged knife for hard wedges, a spreader for chèvre. This six-piece stainless set covers every texture and pairs naturally with the salami or tinned fish on this list.

Serious chocolate people prefer single-origin bars, and Madagascar beans are among the most distinctive, bright and almost citrusy. These 92% bars are made in Madagascar itself under a direct-trade model, so the foodie gets flavor and a good story. Twelve bars last a while, or split them into smaller gifts.

Six single-origin coffees from Ethiopia to Indonesia, each in a 50 g bag, so a coffee-loving foodie can taste how origin and roast change the cup. It is a fun weekend project and a better gift than one big bag of beans they may not like.

Pasta from Torre Annunziata, near Naples, is drawn through bronze dies that leave a rough surface sauce clings to. Eight packs of different shapes in a gold box makes an elegant gift for the foodie who notices why restaurant carbonara tastes better than theirs.

Fresh pasta is the project most food lovers mean to learn. This Italian-made Imperia roller has six thickness settings and cutters for fettuccine and tagliolini, all in heavy chromed steel built to outlast them. Add flour and eggs and it becomes a Sunday tradition.

Wood-fired pizza needs heat a home oven cannot reach. This compact pellet oven passes 1,100°F and turns out a blistered Neapolitan pie in about 90 seconds. It is our pick for the foodie with a patio who keeps complaining about soggy crusts.

Searing scallops on a hot slab of pink Himalayan salt at the table is pure dinner theater, and the salt seasons whatever touches it. Chill it instead and it becomes a serving platter for sushi or melon. The steel holder makes it safe to carry from stove to table.

For the foodie whose fridge door is all hot sauce bottles, the next step is making their own. This kit includes six dried peppers from jalapeño to ghost pepper, a spice blend, bottles, labels and a funnel, enough for up to 20 bottles, so there is plenty to give away.

Fresh mozzarella in about 30 minutes is the kind of trick that impresses dinner guests. This kit has the rennet, citric acid, thermometer and muslin for several batches of mozzarella and ricotta. Just add good whole milk.

Sushi night at home is more fun than ordering in, and this kit makes it easy: bamboo mats, a bazooka roller, temaki cones, a rice mold and a knife. It is a good gift for a foodie couple or someone who likes cooking with friends.

Gastro Obscura catalogs hundreds of strange and wonderful foods and drinks from around the world, and the set pairs it with the original Atlas Obscura. For the foodie who plans trips around what to eat, it is a bedside book and a travel wish list in one.

Every food lover should read Anthony Bourdain's memoir at least once. It is funny, profane and honest about what happens behind the kitchen door, and it explains why so many people fell in love with restaurants. A cheap paperback that pairs well with any edible gift here.

Christina Tosi's Milk Bar cookbook is where cereal milk ice cream and compost cookies come from. It is fun to read and precise in its techniques, ideal for the foodie with a sweet tooth who wants to bake something nobody else at the party would think of.