Spend your bucks at the beach this year

Recently in this column I suggested that (local!) restaurant gift cards make wonderful holiday gifts. Well, true to form, it wasn’t long before I was flooded with emails and texts from readers telling me how they loved the idea. In fact, some of our more creative Cape Region businesses are buying multiple cards from multiple restaurants to create one-of-a-kind gift baskets for clients. After so many years promoting beach dining, I never know when I’ll hit a nerve that so directly benefits our Cape Region eateries. 

So I figured I’d stick with the theme and write about “regular” gifts you can buy locally to wow your favorite foodies. Note the emphasis on locally. Keep your money in town by supporting our entrepreneurial friends and neighbors!

Entrepreneur Sherry Shupe (also of Fur Babies Pet Resort) recently opened Farmacy Market in Milford with business partner Patrick Helmick. This friendly little spot offers an amazing array of tasty gifting goodies, from local artisanal cheeses to locally farmed beef to seasonal fruit and veggies quite literally fresh out of Patrick’s huge garden.

Kitchen & Company near Lewes is a home cook’s happy place. Make them smile with an assortment of color-coordinated spatulas, spoonulas and bowl scrapers (oh, they’ll find a use for them!). And don’t forget the Silpats. Your culinary friends will know what all that stuff is. Just up the road a bit, caffeine lovers will be stimulated by an assortment of La Colombe coffees from Kaisy’s Delights. Make your gift the best part of waking up. While you’re there, treat yourself to one of their cold brews. Yum. And wait ‘til you see their new menus featured at both the Lewes and Millsboro locations.

Personal experiences make great gifts. Snag your beloved a fun stroll through Lewes’ Beach Time Distilling (next door to Keith Irwin’s Old World Breads), or treat your favorite foodie to a reservations-only Paella Feast at Café Azafrán on Baltimore Avenue in Rehoboth Beach. They happen weekly in the summer, but pop up from time to time in the off-season. An Azafrán gift card will do the trick.

Is the target of your affections a BBQ lover? Present a potpourri of smoky tastes with custom-made sauces and rubs available at Bethany Blues. Throw in some of Blues’ cleverly designed apparel. Speaking of spice, if your significant fresser likes it hot, then Peppers.com is the place to get it. Chip Hearn (never without his sense of humor) has come up with, shall we say, adult-themed gift packs of selected hot sauces. Simply go to Peppers.com, and click “gift ideas” and “gift sets.” They’ll do the work for you so no one will see you blushing.

Local musicians and tech-heads! Before you go online for your equipment, check out Mid South Audio’s offerings – speakers, complete DJ systems, microphones, digital mixers, leading-edge lighting systems and even gaffer’s tape – you’ll love the prices (and no Delaware sales tax!) at MSA in Milton. I know this isn’t food, but most of our musicians play in restaurants, so there ya go.

Aladdin Market in downtown Rehoboth is packed with uncommon bites for the internationally inclined. My pick hits are the Beirut brand tahini (the best around for good hummus, trust me!) and the Sultan brand stuffed grape leaves (dolmas to the Greeks, warak enab to our Lebanese friends).

Keep things local this year to help support our entrepreneurial friends and neighbors in the winter season. Your reward will be a treasure trove of distinctive goodies that you won’t find online or in box stores. What better way to wish somebody a tasty Christmas and a delectable holiday?!