Christmas is coming up sooner than you think! One thing I always like to do every year is to make homemade gifts for friends – mostly in the form of food related gifts. In the past I’ve done flavored sugars, varieties of cookies, mini loaves of bread as well as flavored salts. In partnership with Whole Foods Encinitas, I’ve got an easy DIY gift to share with you plus a holiday entertaining idea! Also, HINT HINT – there’s another giveaway at the end of this post! I feel like I’m Santa’s helper lately or something, giving all this stuff away to you guys. 😀
Holiday Gift Idea – Mushroom Salt
To make mushroom salt, I used dried porcini mushrooms. Considering these suckers are $84.99 a pound, I got the least expensive container which had roughly .05 ounces in it for just under $5 (phew). I had a bit of leftover fancy French sea salt I used to make a small bit and I also made some with a nice, flaky Kosher Salt I picked up at Whole Foods for $1.49.
I pulsed the dried mushrooms briefly in our Vitamix and this was the result:
The pieces are kind of large here.
I used this version for the sea salt – you can clearly see the mushroom bits here and I decided to call this the more “rustic” salt. Heh heh.
With the kosher salt, I stuck it back into the Vitamix for a few more pulses to get a finer grind on the salt. This is .025 ounces of dried mushrooms (maybe like a half cup?) plus about 1 and 1/2 cups of kosher salt.
I put the newly made mushroom salt into a cool jar I found at Michael’s over the weekend (for $1.19!). Pretend there’s a pretty bow on it, I didn’t get that far for some reason.
Holiday Entertaining Idea – Wreath Platter
My idea for a little entertainment appetizer is this bit of a twist on a Caprese Salad. First I started with some bunches of rosemary – these are from our garden, but you can buy rosemary bunches at Whole Foods. I used basil leaves as the leaves on the wreath – these are also from our garden.
I used fresh tomatoes plus some fresh burrata cheese I found at Whole Foods as the “ornaments” for the wreath.
It’s pretty, don’t you think? In the middle, I’ve got a salt cellar with some of the mushroom salt for sprinkling on the cheese and tomatoes, plus some already made crostini found in the bakery section at Whole Foods.
Ain’t it pretty? You can see a bit of that mushroom salt I made sprinkled on top there. Fancy!
If you’re looking for additional ideas for the holidays, be sure to check out Whole Foods Encinitas FREE event, happening on Thursday, December 12, 2013.
Date/Time: Thursday, December 12, 2013 from 6 to 8 pm
Location: 687 S Coast Highway 101, Encinitas, CA 92024
Features of the Event:
- Beer & Wine – Holiday favorites, pairings and sampling
- Holiday Cheese Board – How to create
- Premier Party Dips sampling
- Coffee and seasonal treats
They even have some holiday ideas online to help you have the Best Holiday Ever – it’s got Christmas Party idea, DIY gift ideas, Holiday Baking tips and more! One of the items I really liked from this section was the article on how to Build a Cheese Plate. Cheese is near and dear to my heart and I featured it here, so I’m sure you can see why I’d dig that one.
And the fun doesn’t stop here as I’ve got a little giveaway for one lucky ready! I have one $50 gift card to Whole Foods to help assist with your holidays this year. Tell me in the Promo Simple box: How you would use the Whole Foods gift card? Holiday entertaining, making DIY gifts, snacks, etc?
This giveaway runs until December 12, 2013 at midnight PST. One winner will be picked via the PromoSimple box. Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post for Whole Foods Market Encinitas, but I came up with the ideas and photographs on my own! Woohoo!
That mushroom salt is a killer idea! I love it. I’ve seen their dried mushroom section in the Del Mar location but it was soooo expensive.
I don’t think I’ve been to their Encinitas location so I’ll have to check it out when I’m further up North.
I bought the dried porcini so it was a little less expensive. I didn’t need a ton of it either, so I just looked through them all until I found the cheapest one, since they were all different weights. It tasted really good on the cheese!
I would use it to help cater my work party!