American Weekender's 2024 Food & Travel Gift Guide
Featuring vetted picks for the food and travel lovers on your holiday shopping list, plus our biggest newsletter subscription discount of the year!
Welcome to the holiday weekend!
For our annual gift guide, we’ve assembled a collection of items selected with the food- and travel-lover on your shopping list in mind. This year’s offerings include edible treats, books, and travel tools that we’ve personally vetted. We don’t profit from these picks — they are all just things we love and use. From a road trip-ready cooler to fill with edible souvenirs from the road to a cocktail book to improve your at-home drink-making skills, there’s something here for every traveler you’re shopping for this year.
At the end of this newsletter, you’ll also find a link to our Thanksgiving Subscription Sale. It’s our best deal of the year!
Want more gift ideas? Take a look through our 2023 gift guide. We still love those picks — from half-smokes and country hams to backpacks and travel mugs. Now, 10 presents we think everyone on your list will love.
A Pastry Tradition from Wisconsin
Almond Kringle from O&H Danish Bakery ($24.49)
If you aren’t familiar, Kringles are buttery, flaky, filled Danish pastries that are beloved across Wisconsin. The state’s Kringle Capital may well be Racine, where purveyors include Bendtsen’s Bakery, Lehmann's Bakery, and Racine Danish Kringles. While we’ve sampled many different varieties over the years, we always find ourselves coming back to O&H Danish Bakery’s almond-flavored Kringle — it makes for a great start to a holiday morning alongside a hot cup of coffee.
A Signature Sauce from Oregon
Nong's Khao Man Gai Sauce ($12)
Earlier this year, we told you about the Khao Man Gai at Portland Thai restaurant Nong’s. The restaurant’s two locations offer their signature poached chicken and rice dish with their own special tangy sauce, made with ginger, garlic, soy sauce, and chiles. While you can try and recreate the dish at home, you can also use the sauce as a marinade, a dipping sauce, or, as Nong’s suggests, dashed into a Sunday morning Bloody Mary.
Cured Meats from a Lauded Indiana Butcher Shop
Smokehouse Collection ($250)
For over a decade, Indianapolis Hoosiers have enjoyed the world-class cured meats sold at Goose the Market, an entry on this year's Landmark List. Under the Smoking Goose label, their meats are sold in stores and served in some of the best restaurants around the country. Their Smokehouse Collection makes a great addition to any Christmastime feast and offers a robust overview of their charcuterie offerings. It comes packed with a ham, two salamis, three kinds of sausage, and much more.
Midwest-Inspired Coffee from Michigan
Mackinac Island Signature Blend ($18)
We love to seek out local coffee purveyors when we travel, and one such roaster is the Detroit-based Great Lakes Coffee Roasting Company. They source coffee beans from farmers and co-ops around the world and sell both single origin coffees and a number of signature blends. Lately, we’ve been enjoying their Mackinac Island blend, made with beans from Brazil, Ethiopia, Colombia, and Guatemala. The fruity and citrusy notes take inspiration from the Michigan island’s lakes and foliage and would go great with your Kringle.
Beloved Biscuits from South Carolina
Charleston Cravings ($84.95)
Callie’s Hot Little Biscuit is one of our go-to breakfasts when we’re in Charleston. Their online shop sells several biscuit mixes, but we like the ready-to-heat options since it means one less holiday cooking project. The Charleston Cravings package offers a primer to Callie’s offerings, with sausage biscuit sandwiches plus biscuits flavored with buttermilk, cheese and chive, sharp cheddar, and cinnamon. The package also includes Callie’s excellent blackberry jam and pimento cheese, making this gift basket perfect for breakfast and also an excellent accompaniment to the dinner table.
Southern Recipes from a Mississippi Chef
I Am From Here: Stories and Recipes from a Southern Chef ($37.50)
In September, we told you about Snackbar in Oxford, Mississippi, which also earned a spot on this year’s Landmark List. You can explore chef Vishwesh Bhatt’s unique take on Indian-influenced Southern cuisine through his cookbook, I Am From Here: Stories and Recipes from a Southern Chef. The book includes many delicious recipes including Snackbar favorites like sweet tea-brined fried chicken and okra chaat.
Creative Drinks from a Maine Cocktail Bar
Northern Hospitality with The Portland Hunt + Alpine Club ($30)
We first wrote about Portland Hunt + Alpine Club in 2023 and we’re big fans of their house classics like the Green Eyes, a chartreuse sour, and the floral and low-ABV White Noise. The bar landed a spot on this year’s Landmark List and is a staple on all our Maine trips. If Portland isn’t in your travel plans next year, at least you can make the drinks. This book is filled with Hunt classics, so any cocktail lover on your list can make themselves a White Noise along with a bowl of green chile popcorn and see why we love this bar so much.
Our Favorite Cooler for Road Trips
Lifewit Large Cooler Bag ($28)
You can, of course, spend hundreds of dollars on a rugged name-brand cooler. But for us, this affordable, light-weight, soft-sided cooler has been by our side as we criss-crossed the country over the past few years. Paired with a couple reusable ice packs, this cooler is the perfect size to store any culinary souvenirs that need to stay cold, from local cheeses and produce to specialty sausages and freshly canned beers. It also includes several handy exterior pockets to stash a water bottle, wine key, or any snacks you might want for the road.
An Indispensable Luggage Tracker
AirTags ($29)
We’ve been pleasantly surprised by how useful Apple’s little tracking devices can be. When flying, we now tuck AirTags into all our checked luggage. While many airlines now offer general bag tracking in their mobile apps, an AirTag paired with an iPhone can help you find your bag’s precise location. This is incredibly useful when you arrive at the baggage claim only to see attendants have piled dozens of bags next to the carousel. Is your bag there? Is it still making its way from the plane? Just open your iPhone, find your bag instantly, and be on your way to your next adventure.
A Newsletter To Keep You In the Know
American Weekender Newsletter (Thanksgiving Sale: $45 for A Full Year)
Give a year’s subscription to the American Weekender newsletter — 40% off now through Monday! — and ensure that any food-loving travelers on your list stay in the know with vetted recommendations for restaurants, cafes, coffee shops, bars, and food trucks around the country. Paid subscribers to the American Weekender newsletter receive:
All of our free newsletters including our Cover Story profiles of chefs, restaurateurs, and bartenders plus more stories from the road
All our paid newsletters including our most popular Weekend Getaway and Overnight Stay issues, featuring recommendations and dining itineraries for destinations around the country
A free downloadable Field Guide each month highlighting great spots to eat and drink in places like Boston, Madison, New Orleans, and more — all organized into curated daily itineraries
A 50% off discount good for any Field Guide in our library
More surprises to come in 2025
This is our best deal of the year and the perfect opportunity to share your love of food all year long.
Want more? Chat with us on Substack, download our Field Guides, check out our archives, or follow us on Instagram @americanweekender. We’ll be back next week.
Love Kringle, had it for the first time when I moved to Chicago and took a trip to Wisconsin!
Nong's Khao Man Gai forever!!