"mail order" news and stories

It's not quite time to put up the tree (if you have already, congrats over-achievers!), but it is time to start sending out gifts to family and friends you won't be seeing in person this holiday. We've all seen our fair share of bad mail-order gifts (sorry, fruitcake), so we've rounded up a few atypical solutions...

For the drinker who has every bottle: Bellwether Hard Ciders
Just skip the wine altogether and give them something different. A sip of these refined bubbles will feel like Champagne and, just like wine, these go from very sweet to very dry. We have to spotlight their Black Magic, which wasn't possible to produce for more than 100 years. Why? The secret ingredient, long-banned black currants. Prices vary at cidery.com, with discounts after 3 bottles; a case (12 bottles) arrives with free shipping.

For the cheese-obsessed: Murray's Greatest Hits
Can't have a mail-order gift round-up without cheese, we know. Check out this 2 1/2-pound set of the most popular wheels from New York City's famed Murray's Cheese shop: it comes with Old Chatham Camembert, Young Goat Gouda, Tickler Cheddar, Ciresa Mountain Gorgonzola, Sapore del Piave and sea salt crackers. $75 at murrayscheese.com

Have you ever lived in a place and gotten attached to a particular food product that is made in that region? And then you move away and discover that you can't get that product in your new locale? It leaves a void in your life (I have a Toby's tofu pate shaped-hole in my own existence).

For those of you out there who once lived in the Northeast and developed a taste for Turkey Hill ice cream, you can now fill that void for just $86 (that's actually more than I would want to pay for four cartons of ice cream, but to each their own). Sometimes a chance to experience just the right flavor sensation is worth just about any price.

In this week's Wall Street Journal, the ever savvy Catalogue Critic took on one of the most popular types of holiday desserts, cheesecake, to see if a good mail-order one could be found. Cheesecake may not sound like the perfect seasonal dessert, but more than one company that they interviewed reported that holiday sales had "increased in the double digits" over each of the last few years, and virtually all said that November and December were their biggest months of the year.

Orders were placed at five bakeries and testers, including the executive chef of the Four Seasons, were enlisted to judge. They looked for "a firm outside, a creamy interior and a balanced flavor" in each of the plain/vanilla cheesecakes. Their two favorite cakes came from Eli's Cheesecake Company and Junior's. Eli's ($28) was rich and creamy, with a shortbread cookie crust, but had a lemon flavor that not everyone enjoyed. Junior's ($29.95) was picked as the "best overall," as it was creamy, not crumbly, and had a slightly moist sponge cake base instead of a graham cracker crust. They also noted that Junior's is adding 12 flavors to their holiday menu for anyone who wants more than plain cheesecake.

Incidentally, shipping was not a problem for the testers, as all the cakes arrived in pristine condition via overnight shipping, so the cost of getting the cheesecake to your door is probably going to be a bigger concern than what it will look like when it gets there.

Crab cakes are a favorite food of many seafood lovers. They are made with crab meat that is bound together with a small amount of filler then fried (or baked) until crisp. There are a huge number of variations on the basic cake, but the most important ingredient is, of course, the crab. Summer is typically considered to be crab season, but thanks to frozen and imported meats, crab cakes are available to most people year-round. The question is not whether you can get them, but whether they are worth getting. The week, the Wall Street Journal's Catalogue critic asked that very question and taste-tested five kinds of mail-order crab cakes.

All the cakes had to be cooked at home before serving and all but one was shipped pre-formed. The top choices were Philips Seafood and Chesapeake Bay Crab Cakes and More, which came in first and second with only the narrowest of margins deciding the winner. Third place was the Cadillac Crab Cake Co., the company that shipped the crab cakes unformed in a "loaf," allowing you to shape them according to your preferences.

The biggest drawback is that not only are the cakes expensive, but shipping is pricey, too, so keep that in mind when you decide you want a crab cake or three in the dead of winter.

Launched earlier this summer, Crazy for Cheesecake is a blog dedicated to cheesecake. There are cheesecake recipes ranging from traditional to no-bake, as well as tips for how to keep your cheesecake from cracking and how to adjust cheesecake recipes for high altitudes. There are also links to mail-order cheesecake sources like Juniors in Brooklyn and reviews of other cheesecake-related sites. I'm not sure how much more cheesecake I can handle.