Skip to main content
Friday, November 13, 2026Nov 13

Gifts for the cook: 5 new products to put under the tree

Black & Decker's new toaster oven does just that _ toasts and bakes to perfection. But it also combines the latest in air-fryer technology, allowing you to have crispy foods without the fat. Combining the two is a real space saver for small kitchens.
Black & Decker's new toaster oven does just that _ toasts and bakes to perfection. But it also combines the latest in air-fryer technology, allowing you to have crispy foods without the fat. Combining the two is a real space saver for small kitchens. Black & Decker's new toaster oven does just that _ toasts and bakes to perfection. But it also combines the latest in air-fryer technology, allowing you to have crispy foods without the fat. Combining the two is a real space saver for small kitchens.

The cooks on your gift list may have just about everything they need, but it’s still possible to find them something new that fits their culinary skills.

The holidays are an important time of year for the kitchenwares industry, says Joe Derochowski, home industry adviser for market research company NPD Group. In fact, he adds, the last nine weeks of 2017 accounted for 34 percent of all kitchen electric appliance sales.

“To put that in perspective, nine weeks accounts for 17 percent of all 52 weeks in the year, so these weeks are getting much more than an average week,” he says.

So it’s safe to assume that a large percentage of homes will have at least one kitchen-related gift wrapped and waiting beneath the tree.

For a long time, it was just new colors for appliances – like KitchenAid’s fashionable shades for its stand mixers. But now, it appears, manufacturers are looking to make our lives easier and homes more streamlined.