Maybe your holiday gift list includes an Alabama food lover or someone curious about state spirits. Here is your guide to giving a taste of Alabama this year, with goodies grown or made by farmers, fromagers, brewers, distillers, and specialty food producers across the Yellowhammer State.
Gift baskets
If you ever want to share a taste of home, the Alabama Goods stores in Homewood, Huntsville, or online provide a great place to start. The business packages gift boxes with a variety of Alabama-made food products; some boxes are even shaped like Alabama’s map outline. Among Christmas-themed options, Holiday Cheer ($100) includes cheese straws, fudge cookies, butter-toffee peanuts, Priester’s sticks and stones snack mix, and more. Seasonal baskets range from the $35 Happy Holidays to the $250 Holiday Extravagance. Several ship for free.
Oprah’s favorites
For three years in a row, Stone Hollow Farmstead near Harpersville has made the coveted Oprah’s Favorite Things list. This year’s selection was the Blissful Breakfast gift box ($111). Mother-daughter team Deborah and Alexandra Stone include sprouted flour pancake mix, wildflower honey, floral honeysuckle jelly, and rose geranium syrup. Order it online, or shop at Stone Hollow Farmstead’s store at The Market at Pepper Place in Birmingham. Oprah picks from prior years also are available from Stone Hollow, a popcorn-centric Movie Night Box ($78), and Heirloom Popcorn Gift Box ($100).
Award-winning cheeses
Belle Chevre has made goat cheese in Limestone County since 1986. Its current owner added the fabled line of CHEVOO marinated goat cheeses, moving its production from California to Elkmont in 2022.
CHEVOO’s Cheese Board Lovers Gift Box is a reader’s choice for USA Today’s “Best Foodie Gift 2023.” The box ($39.90) includes jars of goat cheese cubes in olive oil infused with herbes de Provence, dill pollen and garlic, Urfa chili and lemon, or Italian black truffle. It comes with serving tongs and a cheeseboard-shaped holiday ornament.
Belle Chevre’s artisanal fig goat cheese spread is another award-winner, capturing gold in its category at the 2023 SOFI Awards by the Specialty Food Association. It also won silver at the 2022-2023 Word Cheese Awards. It, along with Belle Chevre’s original Montrachet-style log, grape leaf-wrapped Greek Kiss, and other tubs of spreadable cheese are available online and in select groceries and specialty shops.
Beer fun
The Casual Pint at The Grove in Hoover is packaging Advent Beer Boxes containing 24 of its brews. The self-styled “craft beerstro” (beer bistro) offers three choices, Variety ($109.99), all Sour ($99.99), or IPA only ($99.99). It comes in cases numbered to count down the days until … it’s gone. Stocks are limited. Pick up at the bar. FMI: (205) 783-1108.
For a cool, fun stocking stuffer, Birmingham Pedal Tours offers gift cards for its bar-hopping group cycle trips around downtown or to the entertainment districts at Avondale, Lakeview, or Pepper Place. The group provides the pedal power, and music plays between stops during the two-hour excursions. Tickets are $199 for groups of 4-6; $349 for gatherings with 8-14. Single seats can be booked online. Bar tabs are extra.
Alabama whiskey
Go top-shelf from an Alabama distiller. Birmingham’s Dread River Distilling Co. offers Batch 2 of its limited-edition Master Series ($106.99), made in honor of military veterans including Dread River’s assistant distiller, Trey Bruner. It’s available at the distillery on Seventh Avenue South and in select ABC stores. Liquor can’t be shipped in Alabama.
The Purveyor’s Series by John Emerald Distilling in Opelika includes “double wood” whiskey or rye that is aged in wood barrels with a flavor boost from floating additional wood staves on the whiskey. John Emerald is available in state ABC stores and top-end privately-owned package stores.
For another gift option, Irons One Distillery in Huntsville offers private tasting events with its founder and distiller, Jeff Irons. The cost is $110 and events can be booked here or by telephone, 256-701-4408.
