2013 Gift Guide: Day Eighteen

Go Fish

Even if your friends live near a coast, if they don't live in a large urban city they very likely lack access to first-rate seafood. That's where Browne Trading Company comes in. Rod Mitchell has been supplying sustainably-sourced seafood to big deal chefs like Eric Ripert and Daniel Boulud for many years.  But he also mail-orders his wonderful products to ordinary people. They run the gamut from wild and farmed fish and shellfish to smoked fish and caviars.  Order before 2 p.m., and you can have it for dinner tomorrow.

What to send?  Any committed cook would be happy to have one of the Turbots (pictured above). Highly prized in europe, this mild, firm-fleshed fish is easy to cook but hard to find on this side of the Atlantic. (You might also consider a pair of Dover Soles.)

Best of all, perhaps, this time of year are Nantucket Bay Scallops. 

They're small. They're sweet.  They're the easiest seafood you'll ever cook.  And they're in season now - for a very short while.  I can't imagine anybody being anything but jubilant to find a package from Browne Trading Company landing at their door.