Best Gifts for 2024

Gift giving: Once you get deep into it, you may find it hard to stop — especially with so many occasions that warrant a gift. From your best friend's birthday to your neighbor inviting you over for a formal dinner (you'll need a host gift) to your parents' anniversary — and all the annual parties and random get-togethers in between — here are our favorite gifts for 2024.

Revolution Toaster

With settings so difficult to read on many modern appliances, actually turning one on — let alone accomplishing something — is a feat in itself. This toaster, though, not only features a bright LCD display but has a touch-screen display and connects to a smart device. The Revolution InstaGLO R270 Toaster Bundle, which comes with a panini press and warming rack, lets you make all kinds of toasting choices, and can be your choice appliance for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And at its most basic level, it can deliver toast that's outside-crunchy and inside-soft and delicious.

Vintage Candy Dispenser

It's decorative! It's retro! It's tasty! For the candy lover in your life, give some colorful sweets in an old-fashioned dispenser that's fun to use (more fun than a jar, for sure). Plus, the hardware comes with over a pound of yummy assorted jelly beans. Let's put this on our Easter gift list.

Cottage Pies

You know chicken pot pies. And you probably know shepherd's pie. But are you privy to the comforting, tasty goodness of cottage pies? In case you're not: Think shepherd's pie but adorned with (in this case) seasoned, choice ground beef instead of (typically) the minced lamb of shepherd's. A complete meal, cottage pie includes carrots, onions, sweet yellow corn, peas, and celery, and is topped with a generous spread of mashed potatoes (and browned, like twice-baked potatoes!) and seasoned with garlic, a dash of black pepper, and a splash of Worcestershire sauce. A perfect gift for the cold post-January months — especially St. Patrick's Day (ignore the pie's British origins).

Toulouse (French-Style) Pork Sausage

Usually, the expression “originating from a town in Southwest France" alone whets the appetite. (The French sure know how to eat!) Now imagine basting this French sausage coil with white wine and adding onion seasoning. Or how about adding it to a slow-cooked, white bean French stew and serving it in a cassoulet? Can you say ooh-la-la about sausage?

New wines

For your vino-loving friends, you have a bevy of gifts from which to choose this year. Check out Harry & David's brand spanking new Royal Riviera Pear Cider, which combines the sweet, delicate flavor of its most famous fruit with crisp apples. Another option is Appella, the new luxury wine label from the Medford, Oregon-based company. Go the extra mile and splurge on the Premium Sweet Wine-Pairing Gift Box, which pairs Appella Cabernet Sauvignon with chocolate-covered truffles and other chocolatey delights.

Last, but certainly not least, are the offerings from Lucca & Sons Cellars. Sure, you can drink these on their own, but these wines goes with everything, from cheese to popcorn and even an at-home spa treatment.

Homestyle Meatloaf Meal

No need to scream at your mother for some meatloaf. Round up as many of your friends as it takes to devour a three-pound loaf and serve this comfort food masterpiece. Along with a traditional sweet tomato glaze-topped serving of ground beef, guests can feast on roasted rainbow carrots in a lemon butter sauce and gourmet mashed potatoes with Rogue Creamery Blue cheese, savory bacon, sour cream, salt, pepper, and chives. And if you still have room, continue the feast with a whoopie pie. One bite, and you'll be shouting...

Seafood Appetizer Assortment

Right about now, some of your loved ones may be missing the sights and tastes of summer. You can bring some back with a seafood assortment, complete with lobster risottos and crab dips, each served in accompanying ramekins. Words like rich, creamy, and luxurious may best describe the experience (even if we can't provide the actual ocean).

Stuffed Cookie Sampler

Cookies always make for a nice gift. Stuffed cookies make for an unforgettable gift. It's the difference, really, between fun and decadent. Harry & David's stuffed cookies start with a yummy cookie dough base, then piles in the stuffing and adds on the toppings, making for unique combinations of flavors and textures. In a typical flavor mix of 12 cookies (the specific combo is a surprise, which is refreshing since there are so few in life anymore), your recipient may find themselves chomping on Salted Caramel Pretzel, Peanut Butter Nutella, Churro Horchata, Chocolate Lava, Lemon Shortbread, or any of seven other varieties.

Mocktails

For someone who doesn't drink alcohol or is taking a break from it, cocktails can be a horrible tease. Aside from their taste — everything from sweet to bitter to smooth to sour — they're often served in beautifully sculpted glassware in exhilarating social situations. Really, it's almost as if the alcohol can be an afterthought, which is where these virgin versions come in. From ready-to-drink cans, five mouth-watering flavors — Scottish Lemonade Moscow Mule, Vida Loca Mockarita, Sevilla Red Sansgria, Caffe Carnivale® Espress0% Martini, and Karma Sucra® Mockapolitan — are ready for guzzling. Plus, they arrive in kits, so your Mockarita, for instance, comes with dried lime slices for garnish.

Shari's Berries Belgian Chocolate Collection

Really, there's never a wrong time to gift chocolate-covered strawberries: birthdays, the holidays, milestones, anniversaries. But given how this confection has become somewhat synonymous with love, how about getting these for Valentine's Day? (Just a little something to think about.) Also, ponder this: Shari's Berries Select Collection Belgian Chocolate-Covered Strawberries are meticulously crafted from high-quality cocoa beans and pure cocoa butter, employing centuries-old Belgian chocolate-making traditions. And Belgian chocolate is considered the best in the world.

Venchi Chocolate Golden Tray Chocoviar

When you name your product after an elite delicacy, you'd better deliver. Venchi does just that with its chocolates — confections crafted in Italy from pure, top-grade ingredients like olive oil, cocoa butter, and a prized variety of hazelnuts...oh, and prized cocoa beans! You'll look like the 1% yourself when you present these assorted, individually wrapped chocolates in Venchi's signature gilded tray. Ultimately, though, the taste is what will garner forever gratitude as your recipient gorges on ingredients like Suprema cream, pistachio Gianduja, salted hazelnuts, almonds, pistachios, salted toffee, and burnt caramel.

Organic Dark Chocolate Bars

We know: Chocolate is an indulgence — the kind that may register on your bathroom scale, much to the displeasure of some. But for anyone who does suffer choco-guilt, consider the benefits of these Vital Choice bars. First, they're made with direct-trade cacao beans. Second, those beans are organic, hailing from small plantations in South America. And third, they're produced in small batches without alkali, dairy, soy, gluten, or emulsifiers. And on the num-num scale, know that these treats are studded with crystallized ginger, dried blueberries, or Himalayan sea salt. We're sure the recipient of these treats can live with that. Can't they?

Peony and Philodendron: 1-800-Flowers.com 2024 Flower and Plant of the Year

Nothing gives a gift that extra luster — and conversation fodder — than when it's earned a “best of" award. And now 1-800-Flowers.com's peony flower and philodendron plant enter that rarified class as they are crowned Flower of the Year and Plant of the Year, respectively.

One of the company's most searched flowers, the lovely and fragrant peony — which blooms in shades of pink, white, red, and purple — is often a top bridal bouquet choice (another fun fact to bestow on its recipient).

The tropical philodendron, meanwhile, wins fans thanks to its easy-care requirements. Choose either the Birkin Plant (pin-striped leaves) or Pink Princess (pink hued, heart-shaped leaves).