Charleston Favorites is another happy example of a businessperson from a “traditional” sector of industry who followed his love into the food business. Proprietor Jimmy Hagood began in insurance sales, and now owns a thriving catering business in Charleston, as well as a manufacturing company that sells Southern specialties throughout the United States. Delicacies such as benne wafers, peach butter, pepper jelly and, of course, barbecue sauces and rubs are just part of a line that sends a taste of the South anywhere.

A charming gift box arrived containing a two-pound bag of Charleston Favorites Stone Ground Grits and an 18-ounce bottle of Tidewater Shrimp Sauce and Marinade. The grits take about 35 minutes to cook; we sautéed the shrimp in about three minutes. The results were one of the best meals we’ve had in a long time—perhaps because, as New Yorkers, we don’t get too much lowcountry cuisine. We added a large green salad, but the oohs and aahs were earned by the grits and shrimp.

Not only would we gladly cook this dinner on a regular basis; we’d send it as a gift to almost everyone, because it requires minimal cooking skills. If you can make hot cereal, you can make grits. If you can pour the contents of a bottle into a sauté pan, add peeled shrimp and stir, you can have delectable Tidewater shrimp. Read the full review on TheNibble.com.

We made this incredibly delicious
S’mores with Tiny Trapeze graham
crackers and chocolate marshmallows,
and a Chocolove 77% cacao Extra
Strong Dark chocolate bar.

If your idea of happiness is a breakfast or brunch of piping-hot bagels, your dream can come true every day. Excellent Bake ’mmm frozen boiled bagels, in standard and gourmet flavors, are shipped directly to your door. Keep them in the freezer or refrigerator, ready to pop into the oven, where they emerge hot and fragrant in just 8 to 12 minutes. Some flavors go beyond ordinary bagels: They’re gourmet breads.

Bake ’mmm Bagels are boiled, then frozen, so the last step in bagel-making—baking to a crisp, golden brown—takes place in your own oven or toaster. Being a bagel baker is not only tasty, it’s fun! Read the full review on TheNibble.com.

Vera Mirkovic and Jennie Näss are a mother-daughter team who, after pursuing their own business careers, joined forces in 2005 to create elegant cookies for people who appreciate European traditions and hand detailing that go into them. Handcrafted in suburban Chicago, the butter cookies, made with imagination and the finest ingredients, can be delivered anywhere.

Nicely gift-boxed, the cookies make a special gift for people who recognize and appreciate something distinctively different. And of course, don’t hesitate to buy a few boxes as a treat for yourself. Read the full review on TheNibble.com.

The question is: How much coffee do you have to drink to get the benefits? The answer: a lot. That’s why we said it’s “good for guzzlers.” Here are some examples:

-A cup of Spava Clarity provides 20mg of ginkgo biloba and 25mg of white tea extract. One of the country’s most prominent neurologists, who specializes in memory, prescribes 120 mg of ginkgo twice a day for normal maintenance of clarity.

-Spava Flexibility contains 30mg of chondroitin sulfate, and 20mg of MSM. Anyone who is concerned with prophylaxis—much less healing and pain—is taking a minimum of 500mg of chondroitin sulfate daily, and similar amounts of glucosamine sulfate. So, this is a drop in the bucket.

-Spava Immunity has 25mg of rosehips per cup, which contain vitamin C, plus 35mg of echinacea; but anyone who takes vitamin C pills for immunity aims for 500mg a day.

However, little bits can add up, and for people who don’t like to swallow pills, 20mg or 30mg is better than nothing at all. While the coffee won’t pass muster with the coffee connoisseur klatsch, it tastes as good as what most people enjoy. And the attractive package is a nice idea. So, if all this makes it worth it to you to pay double the amount for a bag…tear one open and start brewing!

Read the full review of Spava Fortified Coffee and find more about organic, natural & wellness foods in the Nutrinibbles section of THE NIBBLE online magazine.