Ray Isle (@islewine on Twitter) is Food & Wine's executive wine editor. We trust his every cork pop and decant – and the man can sniff out a bargain to boot. Take it away, Ray.

The gift-giving season is upon us, and amid the stress of dealing with family members for whom it is perennially impossible to find an appropriate gift (here, Dad, have another tie!), we should give thanks for cocktail fanatics.

The reason for that is that there’s an endless and ever-changing world of cocktail-related widgets, tools, ingredients, glassware and whatnot out there, and cocktail fanatics never tire of adding new items to their collections. Of course, there are limits. An antique silver punch bowl like the one that sold at Sotheby’s back in 2010 for $5.9 million seems a little over the top to me. Similarly, you could fly him (or her) to Vegas, jump into a limo to the Wynn’s XS Nightclub and splurge on a couple of Ono cocktails at $10,000 a pop. But honestly, why bother? There’s so much out there that’s so cool for so much less money. Here, for instance, are some great cocktail-related gifts for those on more modest budgets.
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Kate Krader (@kkrader on Twitter) is Food & Wine's restaurant editor. When she tells us where to find our culinary heart's desire, we listen up.

The big news this Thanksgiving is the bad weather that’s threatening to be bad news for people’s holiday travel plans. 

Which means you might need to go to Plan B for T-Day dinner. Happily, there are a ton of good choices across the country where you can dig into turkey but also find options for anyone who loathes the traditional meal.

Some of these places will even let you celebrate Thanksgivukkah (the trademarked term for the double whammy occurrence of Thanksgiving and Hanukkah, which won’t happen again for 70,000-plus years).
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America's Test Kitchen is a real 2,500 square foot test kitchen located just outside of Boston that is home to more than three dozen full-time cooks and product testers. Our mission is simple: to develop the absolute best recipes for all of your favorite foods. To do this, we test each recipe 30, 40, sometimes as many as 70 times, until we arrive at the combination of ingredients, technique, temperature, cooking time, and equipment that yields the best, most-foolproof recipe. America’s Test Kitchen's online cooking school is based on nearly 20 years of test kitchen work in our own facility, on the recipes created for Cook’s Illustrated magazine, and on our two public television cooking shows.

Perhaps you tried a deep-fried recipe once and was disappointed at the greasy/burned/undercooked/otherwise unappetizing results, or maybe frying has always seemed like an intimidating prospect. Don't lose hope.

We assure you that hot, crisp, golden, non-greasy, deliciously fried food is achievable by any level of cook armed with the right knowledge. Below we've answered eight common frying conundrums. Here's your opportunity to give frying a go.
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Editor's Note: America's Test Kitchen is a real 2,500 square foot test kitchen located just outside of Boston that is home to more than three dozen full-time cooks and product testers. Our mission is simple: to develop the absolute best recipes for all of your favorite foods. To do this, we test each recipe 30, 40, sometimes as many as 70 times, until we arrive at the combination of ingredients, technique, temperature, cooking time, and equipment that yields the best, most-foolproof recipe. America’s Test Kitchen's online cooking school is based on nearly 20 years of test kitchen work in our own facility, on the recipes created for Cook’s Illustrated magazine, and on our two public television cooking shows.

Are you excited to make latkes, chicken and doughnuts this year, or are you a bit wary of frying at home? If you diligently monitor the oil temperature and keep in mind just a few other points, you’ll find frying is as manageable as any other cooking technique.

All linked products are the test kitchen's recommendations for equipment.

Our frying wisdom is distilled from over 20 years' worth of recipe development; the information below is adapted from our newest book, "The Cooking School Cookbook," a comprehensive reference for every home cook.
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