Food for Thoughtful Gifts

From a $100,000 chocolate extravaganza to a bottle of champagne with a tiara, these goodies will bring out the gourmand in anyone

by Julie Gordon

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One of the best things about the holiday season is the excuse for overeating and over-drinking. Only ascetics and killjoys don't see their weight balloon in the weeks between Thanksgiving and New Year's. Everyone's inner sweet- (or salt-, fat-, or tender-) tooth comes out in full force on turkey day and hunkers down until the new year.

During these months, it's practically impossible to walk a step at the office without stopping at the massive, treat-filled gift baskets your colleagues have accumulated from clients. Or avoid the pieces of chocolate that somehow keep finding their way to your desk. Or have guests over without collecting a few new bottles of wine, wheels of cheese, or various baskets of goodies.

Brown Card or Golden Ticket?

If you think resisting chocolate is hard the rest of the year, just try this confectionery indulgence—the $50,000 "Brown Card" from French master chocolatier Michel Cluizel. The ultimate gift for any true chocolate lover, the Brown Card entitles holders to incredible perks, including a tour of Cluizel's factory in Damville, France, a private lesson on being a "sommelier of chocolate," and private tastings.

For those with an even bigger budget, the Brown Card can be customized for a cost of up to $100,000. For that price, a customer receives a dessert designed by Chocolat Michel Cluizel's executive chef, Belinda Ber.

Ber then gives the client the exclusive recipe and sends the dessert to the home 12 times during the year they have the Brown Card. Also, any time the customer enters the store (there's one in New York), the special dessert is whipped up immediately.

The Brown Card is only part of the ingestible delights BusinessWeek.com examines in this fourth piece in a series of holiday gift guides. Previously, stories covered fashions (see BusinessWeek.com, 10/26/06, "Giving the Gift of Style"), beauty and grooming products (see BusinessWeek.com, 11/3/06, "Presents for Pampering"), and car-related items (see BusinessWeek.com, 11/10/06, "Gifts with Vroom").

Take-Out Ecstasy

If you're looking for a little substance before your sweets, caviar may be the answer. For $1,525, you can get a beautiful basket from Petrossian filled with a 125g tin of Iranian imperial special reserve persicus caviar and other related treats. The persicus can also be purchased separately. Prices range from $9,800 for 500 grams to $505 for 50 grams.

For those who love food but have no time to cook, GourmetStation offers a convenient and delicious meal delivery service. The $999 program gives two people three-course dinners one night a month for a year. Although it's delivered frozen, the food tastes nothing like typical TV dinners. The soups, fish and meat dishes, baguettes, sides, and desserts truly taste like they come from a top restaurant.

There's no question that some people have a preference for beverage over food. If that's your case, try a beautiful bottle of wine or liquor. An entire case of 2000 Château Haut-Brion (Pessac-Leognan) costs $6,600 and is worth it for the incredible flavor and complexity.

For the cognac lover, the Louis XIII de Rémy Martin is a complex liquor with more than 1,200 cognac blends. It comes in an exquisite glass bottle in either the standard 750ml size for $3,000 or the "petit" 50ml version for $400. For a short time this holiday season, champagne maker Moët & Chandon has teamed up with designer Alice Temperley of Temperley London to create a sparkling tiara to sit atop its White Star champagne for $250.

If the indulgence is to be worth the morning-after guilt, a food or drink must be exceptional. When you ponder edible gifts, don't immediately think of the typical fruit cake or box of chocolates. Unless those chocolates were designed for you specially by a master chocolatier in France.

Gordon is a reporter for BusinessWeek.com in New York.