Foodie gifts for Christmas

it's a lucky dip but it actually turns out to be very apt and timely so I'm not sure whether I would truly call it a lucky dip. I could be pondering on this very thing anyway. Serendipity.

The book shown above is a Christmas present to me last year and it's very beautifully laid out. As it's Australian it is also rather more realistic about what we might eat. It's arranged as nine different types of Christmas celebration and includes decorations and gifts as well as food. And of course, you can cook most of the things at any time anyway. The page I opened it at was from the Classic Christmas section and it was the page of gifts you could make. In this case, some sort of mince pies and mini Christmas puddings. Which I won't be making. Well I shall be making mince pies, but not like the ones here. They have to be very traditional.

Anyway I had actually just come back from the daily food shopping which included the Saturday trip to Aldi, where I eyed all their delicious looking Christmas sweet treats. I pondered on fudge, which I love, but in the end decided there were probably only about five pieces in each packet and this would make them about $1.00 a piece. So I reasoned that if I really wanted fudge I could make some. But I did buy some of those thin chocolate sticks. I also eyed the brandy snaps and remembered with nostalgia that this was something that we used to make at home at Christmas. They were such fun to make, so maybe I should give that a go. I haven't done them for years. There are probably lots of contemporary recipes for interesting fillings. None of these things are good for you of course. I was eyeing all these sweet treats, because I am not going to have 'crackers' but will have a little bag or cup of treats at each guests place at the table instead. So I'm sort of looking for the treats.

They also had cookery books - a favourite gift for me - and I confess I bought one of them - by Belinda Jefferey who has become one of my favourite Australian cooks. These were not Christmas cookery books, just a variety of really good ones. However, there are cooks who have produced books dedicated to Christmas - Delia Smith and Maggie Beer are two that I can think of. It's Maggie Beer's pitch at the Christmas market this year. For let's face it it's a commercial exercise producing the book that everyone wants for Christmas.

Christmas is amazingly foody is it not? I'm sure we all have nostalgic memories of Christmases past, and I'm willing to bet that a large part of the memory is the food - and what you eat will largely depend on where you come from and when you eat it. In our family it has to be turkey and it has to be stuffed with Jane Grigson's celery and lemon stuffing - and nowadays we always have gravlax as a first course. But since this is Australia and it's often hot, and also because not all of the family like it, we do not have Christmas pudding or Christmas cake. Dessert is a moveable feast.

But back to my lucky dip and foody gifts for Christmas. I have just read an old Elizabeth David article in which she describes hunting the gourmet shops of London for items to make into hampers for her family and friends. Of course you can buy these ready made, but it's so much more fun to make them up yourself. They can then be tailored to the person you are gifting. For example, my husband likes honey - so, conceivably you could collect together a range of different gourmet honeys, and put them together with something made from honey - cookies of some kind perhaps. Or for the chilli lovers amongst you there's also a wide range of things you could gather together - including chocolate. So there's one idea! Think of what the person likes, collect a whole lot of things together - they needn't be that expensive and then buy a suitable container from the Chinese shop and hey presto - perfect gift.

Or you can make things - chutneys, jams, spice mixes, cakes, cookies, salts ...

Or you can buy cookery books - or even make one. My children, I think, still treasure the one I made for them after they left home. It included all their favourite dishes and showed them how to make them, with variations and tips. Although I say it myself I do believe it started them on the road to enjoying cooking themselves.

Or you can go to Aldi and buy fudge!