The Perfect Pantry®

Gifts for food lovers: For kids who love to cook (Recipe: green bean sesame sauce toss)

Part Two of an eight-part series.  

For years my parents kept a photo of me on their dresser. In the photo, taken when I was just barely old enough to sit upright on my own, I was wearing a cute little frock and Mary Janes, and "reading" a copy of The New Yorker magazine.

I've had my own subscription to The New Yorker since high school, and until just a few years ago, when they stopped publishing this feature regularly, I looked forward to a series of articles every December titled "On and Off the Avenue", which were all about extravagant gift shopping in the swankiest stores in New York City.

Here in The Perfect Pantry, I'm more interested in "On and Off the Kitchen Counter". This week it's gifts for kids who love to cook, like our super-fabulous granddaughter, Sabina, who can read The New Yorker almost all by herself. She is so cool!

Gifts for food lovers: Think outside the box (Recipe: hot buttered rum)

Part One of an eight-part series.

Mighty World Farmer's Market, from Jeffrey's Toys, Market Street, San Francisco

My father wasn't the most creative gift giver in the world.

For every occasion, he went to the same jewelry store and picked out a brooch or necklace much fancier than anything my mother would wear for everyday. Some she loved, some she didn't, but she believed that gifts should be for the person, not for the household, and, to his credit, my dad never put a big red bow on a washing machine.

My mother wasn't a food person. If she were, she might have loved a sesame seed grinder, a tagine, a stack of cookbooks, or a Viking six-burner stove -- all gifts for the household, but all things a foodie might love. I know. I love mine.

Call me crazy, but I'd much rather get a hand-carved wooden spoon than a piece of jewelry.

My husband Ted knows that about me, and over the past 18 years, since food writing became my work, he's become the most creative searcher-outer of eclectic, fun, practical, interesting, wacky, lovely, and downright cool stuff, whether from halfway around the world, or around the corner.

Inspired by Ted's ideas, and by gifts I've received and purchased for my food friends, every Tuesday from now until your favorite December holidays I'll be sharing gift suggestions for the food lover in your life.