Costco Loyalists Share The Best Luxury Holiday Foods To Buy Up

Lila Beudert-Gluckman of Sag Harbor, New York, shops for filet mignon at Costco during the holidays. “[The] quality of the meat is great! We usually bring it for family parties or group ski trips with friends,” she said. “Perfect dinner for a group.” Costco has a number of incredible options. There are choice and prime steaks, as well as full tenderloins, but the creme de la creme is the Japanese wagyu. A set of eight 6-ounce filets will set you back a cool $629.99. These steaks come from full-blood, wagyu-certified cows and are imported from Japan’s Kagoshima prefecture. Steaks can be ordered online and are shipped frozen using next-day air.

Montauk, New York-based Laura Euler gift shops for foodie friends in the Costco aisles. “[I’ve] bought the chocolates as gifts, and I often make spiced or sugared nuts, which are cheaper to buy in bulk there.” Costco is chock-full of chocolates and nuts, and has a long list of luxury items in these departments, available both online and in-store. Belgian chocolatier Godiva, for instance, sells its assorted holiday boxes of chocolates in four-packs at Costco.

Celebration season requires a celebratory drink. Cue the Champagne. “Don’t forget the liquor,” Euler offered as a requisite for the season. Costco sells Veuve Clicquot, Dom Pérignon and Ruinart gift sets, all of which come with Riedel glassware. Keep them for yourself, or gift them out as really thoughtful, tasteful gifts. The Veuve gift basket ($119.99) comes with the yellow label Champagne, two flutes, a Champagne bucket, and a selection of chocolates. The Dom basket features two Champagnes, brut and rosé, both from the 2008 vintage, along with two glasses ($469.99). And the Ruinart package includes a blanc de blancs Champagne, a rosé Champagne, and two stemless Champagne flutes ($199.99).

Iowan Jason Hoffman swears by this Italian treat. “Costco sells the hard-to-find, imported panettone for Christmas in November and the beginning of December for a low price,” he said. “We buy at least two around the holidays.” The 35-ounce cake, studded with dried fruit, clocks in around $7. It’s the steal of the season. Since the sweet bread comes in the traditional Italian wrapped box, it’s a great grab-and-go gift.

Talk about a luxury item. At the holidays, Emily Greenstein of Massachusetts swears by king crab legs “every year.” Her husband’s family “always serves king crab legs for Christmas dinner (I think since they lived in Alaska back in the day). So we buy them at Costco, steam them and serve with lots of butter and lemon. Yum!” You can buy these legs in the warehouse by the pound, but online, you can select the Northwest Fish Wild King Crab Legs in 10-pound portions (which comes to around nine to 12 legs). Crab legs are already fully cooked and then frozen. They’re also certified sustainable and hail from the ice-cold waters of Alaska and the Bering Sea.

“I definitely buy the smoked salmon for Sunday morning bagels when guests are here,” said Judith Cowan of Massachusetts. Smoked salmon is one of Costco’s best affordable luxury items. The Trident Seafoods smoked salmon gift pack is 2.5 pounds of vacuum-sealed, quality fish that can be easily gifted to the lox lover in your life. The salmon is wild-caught Alaskan sockeye smoked over alder wood. It’s incredibly high-quality, and, at $49.99 per package, it also won’t break the holiday bank.

Cowan is also a dedicated Costco shrimp buyer — especially during the holidays. “Their shrimp are the best,” she said. “I always use them for shrimp cocktail.” Costco sells raw, frozen shrimp in varying sizes, the largest of which are perfect for using in your holiday shrimp cocktail. The Kirkland Signature brand comes in 31-40-count, 21-25-count and 11-15-count bags. Prices range from $16.49 to $21.49 (for a 2-pound bag). While these bags are only available at the warehouse, you can also purchase peeled, deveined, uncooked 21-25-count Gulf shrimp from Costco.com. The online price, $99.99, includes three 2-pound bags of certified wild American shrimp, shipped frozen. However, Cowan stressed that she prefers the 15s. “And my entire family says my shrimp are the best!” she said.

Albert Tu of California pointed me to this whole leg of Ibérico ham, which comes with its own stand. “This year, I’d probably do it,” he said of last year’s missed opportunity. The Covap Jamon Ibérico Bellota Ham Leg with Stand and Knife is a staggering 15 pounds of meat. It’s not cheap, either. At $559, this is a gift for a true gourmand (but compared to the $1,000 non-Costco version, it’s a pretty good deal). Bellota ham is a specific type of high-grade meat that is acorn-fed and aged for several years. Pigs are free-range and are given a minimum of 2.5 acres in which to roam. Raised in the Valle de los Pedroches in southern Spain, they are also “Aenor Certified,” a designation denoting a high level of animal welfare.

Personally, when it comes to Costco, I’m all about that caviar. Costco sells about a dozen caviar options, from the entry-level to the off-the-charts expensive. The most expensive, Malossol Osetra caviar — a whole kilo of it costs nearly $1,300 — comes from farmed Russian sturgeon and is accompanied by two mother-of-pearl spoons, a black thermal caviar tote, and enough caviar to feed 30 people. But given the sheer number of choices, you can choose the price — and volume — that’s right for you. Elsewhere, a kilo of Malossol Osetra would cost somewhere around $4,000-$5,000.