Ever since Covid, my family and I have been exchanging food as gifts. Grocery-hopping to stores with empty shelves scared our grandparents, so a new family tradition was born.

These gifts consist of homemade pies, cookies, breads, pastries, dried figs from a relative’s tree, frozen chicken pot-pies, ginger marmalade, honey purchased from a family farm and bean soup in a mason jar (dry). A cousin who doesn’t cook will be gifting us with empanadas purchased from a co-worker; she’s very creative with packaging and makes her gifts look like they came from an expensive boutique. Our younger cousins are making soap, peppermint bark and sewing gift bags.

My brother is waiting for the price to drop on a certain wine. When it does, he pays a visit to the store manager who gives him a discount if he buys a certain amount. My mom is making her signature mini fruit tarts and placing them in holiday tins she purchased last year for about 50-99¢ each. She also wants to make madeleines.

This year, we’re adding DIY fresh fruit baskets at the request of our grandparents. The kids are getting money stuffed inside an origami frog (last year’s crane was a failure). I will be making several frozen lasagna (9x9) and mini loaves of banana bread baked in holiday-themed stoneware (very inexpensive).

My entire family would absolutely welcome you and your pickled okra; we don’t have a pickle guy. We have my uncle who made pickled bitter melon… it wasn’t bad.

EDIT: My dad made vanilla extract during lockdown, it took almost 2 years but it was a hit!

Just curious if anyone has any similar plans in mind and what y’all are making.

My spouse and I are not very much into making/receiving gifts as a general rule, but we’re all in for DIY/craft or fixing old stuff and making them like new again. We both cook too, she will bake pies and pastries which is something I’ve never enjoyed doing (but will gladly eat 8), while I do love cooking meals. So it’s kinda easy for us to not spend a fortune while doing stuff we know the other will appreciate.

Next month, I plan on giving a refurbished laptop running Linux to a young dude that is broke but needs a machine for studying. I will upgrade and clean the machine to make sure it will run smooth for as long as possible, and since it will run Linux I know it will run smooth even if it’s not the newest machine.

For this Christmas, I hope I’ll be able to craft for myself a… cardboard cabinet for storing my analog Zettelkasten. I’m huge into cardboard as its cheap material (free, when using recycled boxes and packages) and easy to work with, while still being sturdy enough for many usage. Recently, for a friend, I made a cardboard iPad holder that’s similar to the one I made for myself (just prettier ;) after they asked me where they could get one.

For my spouse, unlike we usually do for one another this time I want it to be a real surprise, she recently told me she would like for us to start writing to one another like we used to do when we met (we’re both well into our 50s, and have been together for almost 30 years). She mentioned it a few times already. So far, I have managed to dodge replying to her suggestions but my Secret Plan is this: instead of writing her an email, I will start sending her… good old snail mail, and postcards, decorated with mail art, like I used to do when I was younger.

Im not a big gift giver. I prefer to take advantage of opportunities to give a gift that is something someone would want. That being said I would rather recieve what you are talking about even if you were loaded. It sounds awesome. My wife and I have traded food with neighbors and such but again not for a specific holiday necessarily. The things that I enjoy in holidays are often something more participatory like caroling for xmass.

I’m making origami animals out of dollar bills for my friend’s kids.

Everyone appreciates the pickle guy and other homemade stuff, good on you. I used to make wines and those always went over well.

Apple butter. Picked up 12 pounds of apples from Costco for like 12-15$ and that gave me about 15 8oz jars of butter that keeps for months while canned. Add a little decorative filigree and boom tasty gifts for cheap. Oh and it makes the whole house smell awesome all day. In my dreams I want to have a 50 gallon cauldron and make a batch

I like the idea of giving a very specific trinket or gift to a person based on what I understand of their wants and needs.

If I feel like that is insufficient, then I will also add cash to it, so it’s like, I was thinking of you, and I also know you were thinking of yourself, and so this is the perfect combo gift.

Fuck your gift cards, and nobody’s getting a gift card.

You get cold card cash, and then something that is meaningful and not onerous or painful.

Like I have one friend that likes guns and reading and anime so I will draw them something as their gift that is anime related and then give them like 50 bucks because they’re adults and they don’t need the cash but I want them to know I’m thinking of them.

I have another friend that really likes old scary movies, and it’s hard to find them, so I just give him cash.

If they spend it on food, or weed, or gas, or whatever, instead of purchasing a gift for themselves, then that’s perfectly fine. You know, it is the thought that matters.

My wife and I have done homemade christmas gifts for the last two years for everyone. We have made lots of baskets so that we can give more gifts of these homemade goods instead of a fewer giftst that we spend lot of money on. We still buy some gifts for my nibblings but everyone else is getting the homemade gifts.

This year I have already made some garlic chives infused rice vinegar this spring from my excess garlic chives. I also made some apple butter from the apples from our tree which we will be giving. So I have already been crafting based on seasonal avaiability from my garden.

I have made some handmade salves the last year so I will likely remake our peppermint infused hand salve and will make more of my favorite skin recovery salve infused with Calendula and Plantain. We made a rose and lavender salve last year but might make the same recipe as a oil.

We might make another dried tea blend in our gift blend. Trader Joes has a winter wake up tea that I want to recreate using bulk herbs. The local co-op has a mulling spices and a great black tea that should blend perfectly together.

I am sure I am going to make some additional food but unsure what yet. We did a bacon onoin jam, garlic confit and chili oil previous years. We might remake one of those again.

Have the Peyton manning meme made into a custom jigsaw puzzle and give each relative a different piece

sigh… it’s that time of the year again :( wish I was a kid again.

Pickled Okra is amazing…I had it randomly leaving NOLA once.

Edit: I don’t think anybody ever plans to be the pickle guy it kind of chooses you.

When I make stuff it’s usually been like hand made Christmas decorations/mementos, or cards with a letter inside talking about anything important I might want someone to know. Sometimes a drawing.

Homemade cookies for friends and family. Decorating a plain paper lunch sack to put them in makes the gift more personal.

A reminder to check in around new years for holiday clearance items you can pack away for next year (like holiday coloring books for kids, etc).

I’m no mead maker (just inept home brewer)but doesn’t it need to age for a while? Better get on it.

If you can make a good relish or something like that to put on bread or with cheese and crackers, that’s always worth a shot too.

Apple butter, cranberry orange jam, candied jalapeños, or chocolate peppermint crinkle cookies are what I make for people.

Green tomato chutney and oven dried wild leeks have both gone over well in the past. I’m not sure what we’ll do this year, so thanks for bringing it up. Now I’ve got some time to plan.