Mother’s Day Gift Guide

Friends, hello! You know I love a gift guide, and I love hearing your ideas as well. Please share any thoughts/ideas in the comments below. Here are a few things I think would make great gifts for any mother figure in your life:

iPhone Butter Case

For the mother butter lover in your life… a butter iPhone case. You could pair it with…

… a round of really good butter. This site has a lot of nice-looking butters, too.

Utility Canvas Cloth Napkins

For the mother in your life always in search of the perfect cloth napkin: Utility Canvas Cloth Napkins. I love a cloth napkin, but I am not someone who will iron a napkin. These napkins launder beautifully! I have a set of red, too, which I love during the winter holiday season.

I love the stitching:

Chainmail Scrubber

For the mother in your life who hates cleaning eggs and dough from pans and bowls: Chainmail Scrubber. I want to give every cook I know one of these — every time I use it, I find myself wondering how I’ve made it this far in my life without one. I wrote about it in my holiday gift guide and noted I had been loving it for cleaning my cast iron skillet. I now use it for nearly everything — glass, stainless steel, nonstick pans — it is surprisingly soft/gentle but works so effectively. The only surface I do not use it on is my Le Creuset enameled cast iron pots and pans.

Wooden Pig Cheese Board Pick Holder

For the cheese board assembling mother in your life: Pig with Appetizers Fork Set: I saw this at Honest Weight Food Coop in Albany, and thought it was so cute and festive. It comes in various shapes (including a snail!), and I love them all.

You could pair it with a beautiful board and Wine & Cheese Board Deck.

Isn’t the pig fun on a cheeseboard?

Colu Henry’s Better at Home

In a recent newsletter, Emily Nunn described Colu Henry as “casually elegant,” and I couldn’t agree more. For the elegant mother in your life who loves cooking , Better at Home:is the perfect gift.

When I read the headnotes to the celery salad recipe, in which Colu notes the inspiration — Gabrielle Hamilton’s blue cheese toasts topped with celery salad — I had to make it immediately. It was wonderful:

You could pair Colu’s book with Gabrielle Hamilton’s latest memoir, Next of Kin, every word of which I am relishing:

Lido: Recipes and Stories from Italy’s Beach Clubs

For the Italophile mother in your life, Lido by Melissa Pellegrino and Matthew Scialabba, owners of Bufalina, one of my favorite pizza restaurants. For those of you familiar with Pizza Night, Melissa kindly shared a recipe for a roasted lemon salsa and shrimp pizza for the summer chapter. It continues to be a favorite. In Lido, Melissa and Matt share stories and recipes from Italy’s beach Clubs, a phenomenon I knew nothing about prior to picking up Lido, but which I am now eager to explore.

You could pair the book with a box of delicious taralli: Sfizi Taralli:

These are great for the cocktail hour.

Ali Rosen’s latest rom-com, The Slow Burn, about a chef who leaves NYC (after a breakup and restaurant fire) to work for her best friend’s pasta-making nonna in the Italian countryside, would complete the Italian-themed bundle nicely.

A Hello Fresh Meal Kit

For the mother in your life who likes to cook but despises shopping/planning: A Hello Fresh Meal kit … or 10! Inspired by a friend who signed up for a once-a-week meal kit this winter to reduce her reliance on takeout, I jumped on board. I was shocked by how much I loved the experience, and by how much my kids loved every meal I tried.

You could gift a single meal kit, a handful of meal kits, or a subscription (use code HFALI), which at the moment comes with 10 free additional meals (and free breakfast) 🎉

The gochujang chicken and rice bowls are a favorite:

… but there are so many good ones, and you can find meals for any diet.

Prepping dinner has never been so much fun 🤩

An Ambient Temperature Thermometer

For the sourdough-baking mother in your life, an ambient temperature thermometer. This is another one of those gadgets I kind of can’t believe I’ve made it so long without: it is so handy for bread baking as it instantly gives you a read on your kitchen or any space you intend to rise your dough in or keep your sourdough starter cozy. You could pair it with a sourdough starter stirrer, a tool I find indispensable for feeding and stirring my sourdough starter.

Vitamina T: Your Daily Dose of Tacos, Tortas, Tamales, and More Mexican Street Food Classics

For the Mexican food-loving mama in your life: Vitamina T by Jorge Gaviria and Fermín Núñez. This book is filled with authentic recipes and traditional techniques for classic Mexican street foods. You could pair the book with dried chiles de arbol and/or tomatillos…

… or you could make a few of the sauces yourself. I recently made the salsa verde and the salsa de chile de arbol (very spicy and delicious), and I loved the simple process of boiling the vegetables/chiles, then puréeing them with the cooking water, herbs, spices, and fresh lime juice or vinegar.

Ella Quittner’s Obsessed with the Best

For the chart-making, recipe-comparing, perfection-seeking mother in your life, Ella Quittner’s Obsessed with the Best. This is a fun one, and while I have not made any of the recipes yet, I have enjoyed reading the various passages about biscuits, pancakes, latkes, meatballs, chocolate chip cookies, and more. Ella is a great writer, and I am so looking forward to exploring the recipes soon.

Shea McGee’s Around the Table

For the mother in your life who loves having people over just so she can make a tablescape, Shea McGee’s Around the Table. Shea has a beautiful sense of style/design, and this book, which is organized by the seasons, is filled with inspiring ideas for tabletops and entertaining as a whole as well as recipes.

Two Gardening Zines

For the gardening-curious mother in your life, two little, approachable zines that may just plant the seed: The Uncomplicated Gardener and Garden to Table All Year.

You could pair them with a self-watering seed pot:

Fish Wife Caviar

For the mother in your life, who seemingly has everything: Caviar! You could pair it with a nice bottle of white wine or champagne 🥂

The Great Crop Tee

For the mother in your life in continued pursuit of a perfect white t-shirt: The Crop Tee

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