Tired of always bringing your host some flowers or a bottle of wine? Feeling especially grateful for someone's hospitality? Or maybe you just need a personal pick-me up? Gourmet lovers are certain to appreciate these exceptional versions of ordinary goods.

Butter and salt are staple items we all take for granted, but what better way to give someone a lift than to insert a little luxury into every day?

Spending $10 on a stick of butter or $14.99 on 6.5 ounces of Peruvian Pink salt may make you wince a little, but the most dangerous thing about these artisanal products is that once you've tasted the best, it's hard to go back.

Sevre and Bell Cow's Milk Butter ($9.99) contains sea-salted crystals gathered by hand from the salt marshes of Ile de Re, an island off the west coast of France. Cream from Charentes-Poitou is matured for 18 hours, giving it a distinctive, slightly nutty taste, and is then churned in small batches. This butter is simply better. Eating bread and butter will suddenly feel like feasting.

Or, pick up a more specialized version such as D'Artagnan Truffle Butters (white truffle, 8 ounces, $12.99; black truffle, 8 ounces, $10.99) made with Vermont butter, shavings of truffle, truffle juice and soy salt. Ideal for everything from risotto to eggs to finishing sauces. Simply imagine the difference between a plain baked potato and a baked potato topped with a dollop of white truffle butter. Peasant food no more.

These butters or others like them are available at Giant Eagle Market District, Whole Foods and various other grocery stores.

Salt used to be such a treasured, valuable commodity that it started wars; now, it's so taken for granted that most of us eat way too much of it. Still, most people would be surprised to know how many kinds of salt are available to the curious cook.

The new salts may not be the subject of warfare, but they are the favorite weapon of many talented chefs.

Try sel gris, sea salt from Brittany harvested in clay beds, which results in exceptional purity and flavor. The color comes from the mineral content of the clay beds. Besides the many varieties of natural salts from all over the world, there are also many naturally flavored salts. Chile Verde salt from the Artisan Salt Company, available at Sur la Table, is perfect for any dish with Southwestern or Mexican flavors. Try adding it to guacamole or use it as a finishing salt on tacos or empanadas.

Williams-Sonoma salts have an Italian bent, such as Sicilian Sea Salt with black olives or blood orange zest. At Whole Foods, there's an emphasis on health, with natural salts such as Celtic Sea Salt and Himalania Pink Salt that are high in healthful minerals such as calcium, magnesium, potassium, copper and iron.

For these and other interesting varieties, ask what's available at grocery stores and gourmet shops, or go online for an endless array of options.

LET THE BUBBLES FLOW

It wouldn't be New Year's Eve without something sparkling to drink, but rather than breaking out the top-shelf bottles this year, why not make use of your creativity as well as your wallet? Pick up a couple of cases of a cheaper bubbly, such as Piper-Sonoma Brut (004684, $12.99 on special) and make sparkling wine cocktails. For even more savings, pick up a magnum of the Freixenet Cordon Negro Brut Cava (005110, $19.99 on special). Try a classic version or mix it up with the Crimson Bubbles recipe created by the chefs at the Culinary Institute of America.

If you've an extra thousand or so to spare this holiday season, this dinner sounds like an enviably lovely way to spend it. Lautrec Restaurant at the Nemacolin Woodlands Resort is hosting an Evening of Truffles 7 p.m. Jan. 16. Wines will be from the Pio Cesare Estate in the Piedmont Region of Italy, which also happens to be famous for its white truffles. Winemaker Pio Boffo himself will be present to speak about the wines, along with Allan Uchrinscko, the wine and spirits manager at the resort.

An 11-course dinner will be prepared by Chef David Racicot. Almost every course of this dinner will include truffles, and it will be designed to highlight Piedmont's flagship grape, Nebbiolo.

The price of $1,000 per person includes accommodations for one night at the Chateau Lafayette, tax tip and gratuities included. Additional dinners or a dinner without accommodations will cost $800. Reservations are required, and seating is limited. Call 866-344-6957 for more information.

Recipes

• 1 cube raw sugar or 1/2 teaspoon loose raw sugar
• 2 or 3 dashes of angostura bitters
• 5 ounces Champagne brut or cava brut
• Lemon twist for garnish

Drop sugar cube into a chilled 6-ounce flute. Wet the sugar with the bitters. Top slowly with chilled sparkling wine. Stir gently. Garnish with a short strip of lemon peel, first twisting it over the glass to release the flavorful oils into the drink.

Makes 1 serving.

-- "Tiny Bubbles: Fizzy Cocktails for Every Occasion, Using Champagne, Prosecco and Other Sparkling Wines" by Kate Simon (Chronicle Books, $14.95)

• 1 sugar cube
• 1 1/2 ounces pomegranate juice
• 1 ounce currant juice
• 8 pomegranate seeds
• 6 ounces champagne

Place one sugar cube in the bottom of a chilled champagne flute. Pour in pomegranate and currant juice, add pomegranate seeds and top with chilled champagne.

Makes 1 serving.

Chef's tip: You can substitute champagne with sparkling wine or, for a "mocktail," use sparkling cider.

-- Doug Miller, lecturing instructor at the Culinary Institute of America