Our Favorite Foods of the Year

This year we sampled more than 248 products in no less than 20taste teststo discover our favorite brands of the foods we buy time and again. There were some winners that surprised us and some that didn't. There were a few items, like our favorite strawberry jam, that proved that sometimes a shockingly high price tag might be worth it—and there were others—looking at you, vanilla ice cream—that proved that sometimes it's definitely not.

Below, you'll find brief summaries of our findings, with a link to each review so you can read a little more about how we tested each item and check out the runners-up.

Our Favorite Whole Wheat Bread:ArnoldandFreihofer's

Our quest to find the best whole wheat sandwich bread revealed a tie for the top: Freihofer's and Arnold. The two loaves were each robustly flavored (nutty, slightly sour, and a touch sweet). They each had well-sized, rectangular slices with toasted grain–coated tops and would taste equally good on aham & cheeseas they would toasted and slicked with strawberry jam.

BUY IT:Arnold Whole Grains 100% Whole Wheat Bread, $4 for a 24-ounce loaf at Jet.com

BUY IT:Freihofer's Country Stone Ground 100% Whole Wheat Bread, $4.50 for a 24-ounce loaf at AmazonFresh

For our full whole-wheat bread taste-test results, including anorganic pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Flour Tortillas:Maria and Ricardo's

Essential for the holidays—how else are you going to make aleftovers quesadilla?—our favorite flour tortillas come from Maria and Ricardo. These tortillas charred beautifully in a skillet and had great flavor without being overpowering. They're incredibly light, but won't rip when rolled into a burrito or flipped into a quesadilla.

BUY IT:Maria and Ricardo's White Flour Tortillas, Burrito Size, available in store at select Whole Foods and other regional supermarkets

For our full flour-tortilla taste-test results, including our favoritestore-brand tortillas, clickhere.

Our Favorite All-Purpose Flour:Arrowhead Mills

We baked sugar cookies and scones to determine the best all-purpose flour forbaking. The winner was Arrowhead Mills, an organic brand that produced tender, flavorful bakes that kept their shape and performed as expected. Since it's a bit of a niche brand, however, we also selected a best option among more common brands:Gold Medal Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, which outshone the remaining competition based on its nutty flavor.

BUY IT:Arrowhead Mills Organic Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, $15 for six (22-ounce) bags on Amazon

To read more about our all-purpose flour taste test, clickhere.

Our Favorite Chocolate Chips:Ghirardelli

Our favorite chocolate chips came from Ghirardelli. We considered both semi- and bittersweet chips and the bittersweet landed the top spot. We ate them plain andbaked into cookies—and those cookies were some of the best we'd ever had.

BUY IT:Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chocolate Premium Baking Chips, $6 for a 20-ounce bag on Jet

For our full chocolate chip taste-test results, includingthe best chocolate chips for snacking straight out of the bag, clickhere.

Our Favorite Canned Pumpkin Purée:Libby's

We tried nine different brands of canned pumpkin purée, and first of all: who knew there were so many brands!? The winner was no surprise: Libby's 100% Pure Pumpkin. While the pantry veg is most ubiquitous at Thanksgiving (hello,pumpkin pie), the canned stuff is also great forsoupsand curries.

Buy It:Libby's 100% Pure Pumpkin, $2 for a 15-ounce can at Target

For our full canned pumpkin taste-test results, including anorganic pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Crunchy Peanut Butter:Santa Cruz

最好的脆花生黄油你可以买by Santa Cruz. It's a natural peanut butter, which means you'll need to stir it vigorously upon first opening, but dipping into it regularly thereafter should suffice to keep it well mixed. We preferred the deep aroma and flavor of the brand's dark-roasted variety to the more delicate light-roasted, but both tasted of fresh peanuts with well-dispersed chunks and great all-around texture.

BUY IT:Santa Cruz Organic Crunchy Dark-Roasted Peanut Butter, $5 for a 16-ounce jar at Thrive Market

For our full crunchy peanut butter taste-test results, including thebest unsalted variety, clickhere.

Our Favorite Strawberry Jam:INNA Jam

For the ultimate PB&J, pick up a jar of INNA Seascape Strawberry Jam—a premium variety that stole the show at our jam taste-off. It tastes boldly of bright, stewed berries and makes an ideal sandwich or morning yogurt bowl addition. If that's too much jelly for your pocketbook though, we did have a few runners-up that present a more affordable option.

BUY IT:INNA Jam Seascape Strawberry Jam, $14.50 for a 10-ounce jar at select Whole Foodsor atinnajam.com

For our full strawberry jam taste-test results, including abest budget buy, clickhere.

Our Favorite Almond Butter:Trader Joe's

Prefer almond butter to peanut butter? How about cashew butter? Because the winner of our almond butter taste test, Trader Joe's Creamy Almond Butter, contains small amounts of cashews in addition to almonds. The stowaway nut doesn't affect the nutrition (if that's why you're eating almond butter), but for people that want 100% almonds, we picked a runner-up:Crazy Richards.

BUY IT: Trader Joe's Creamy Almond Butter, available in store at Trader Joe's

BUY IT:Crazy Richard's Almond Butter, $15 for a 16-ounce jar at Amazon.com

For our full almond butter taste-test results, includingone that won't fall off your knife, clickhere.

Our Favorite Mayonnaise:Blue Plate

Soon after we released the results of our mayo taste off, I received an email from a concerned Alabamian who let me know that in his state, "everyone knows Blue Plate is bottom-shelf stuff." Perhaps he didn't know thatI grew up partially in Alabama, still have family there, and could bear witness that he was mistaken. At any rate, everyone on the Epicurious tasting panel agreed that it was the best mayonnaise money can buy, and I've been stocking it in my fridge ever since.

BUY IT:Blue Plate Real Mayonnaise, $3 for a 30-ounce jar at Target.com

For our full mayonnaise taste-test results, including anorganic pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Ketchup:Heinz Organic

It was a surprise when classic Heinz didn't take the top spot in our ketchup taste test. But in its place was that bottle's highfalutin brother, Heinz Organic—blame our graduated palates. The organic variety had more balanced flavor: sweet and sour with a spicy kick, and better texture than that trusty stalwart.

BUY IT:Heinz Organic Tomato Ketchup, $5 for a 32-ounce bottle on Amazon

For our full ketchup taste-test results, including asurprising runner-up, clickhere.

Our Favorite Spicy Brown Mustard:Kozlik's

We had a hard time picking a winner from among the top five contenders in our mustard taste test. The ultimate prize went to Canadian brand Kozlik's, whose pungent, spicy mustard had a fermented quality that gave it boatloads of flavor, pushing it ahead of all other brands.

BUY IT:Kozlik's Deli Mustard, $6 for an 8-ounce jar at Kozliks.com

For our full spicy brown mustard taste-test results, including aless assertive, but still delicious pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Kosher Dill Pickles:Claussen

Claussen's spicy, refrigerated pickle spears won our pickle taste test, hands down. They were crunchy and vinegary—perfect for snacking or pairing with a sandwich or chopping into a relish. Frankly, I'll never buy another pickle again.

BUY IT:Claussen Kosher Dill Spears, $5 per 24-ounce jar at AmazonFresh

For our full dill pickle taste-test results, includingthe pickle that divided the Epi staff, clickhere.

Our Favorite Mild Salsa:Desert Pepper

In our most convivial taste test, Salsa Divino from Desert Pepper came out on top. It had enough spice to let us know that we were eating chips withsalsa, not just a bowl of chopped tomatoes, and finished with zingy lime and herbal cilantro.

BUY IT:Desert Pepper Salsa Divino, $8.50 for a 16-ounce jar on Amazon

For our full salsa taste-test results, including ournostalgia pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Canned Tuna:Wild Planet

In ourleastconvivial taste test, we ate unadorned, undressed, water-packed tuna straight out of the can. While we can't recommend doing the same, we can guarantee that Wild Planet, our winner, is the best can on the shelf forall your favorite tuna recipes.

BUY IT:Wild Planet, Wild Albacore Tuna, 12 (5-ounce) cans for $34 on Amazon.

For our full canned tuna taste-test results, clickhere.

Our Favorite Coconut Water:Harmless HarvestandZola

Our two favorite coconut waters are both made with coconuts from Thailand. We picked one organic,pink version(Harmless Harvest); and one mostly clear version (Zola) so that any kind of coconut water consumer can have a go-to. The winners were a happy combination of natural sweetness with hints of sourness and salinity, which is what makes coconut water so thirst-quenching.

BUY IT:Harmless Harvest Coconut Water, $5 for 16 ounces at AmazonFresh

BUY IT:Zola Original Coconut Water, $55 for 12 (1-liter) tetra-paks at Amazon

For our full coconut water taste-test results, clickhere.

Our Favorite English Breakfast Tea:Teapigs

确定最佳英国早餐茶,我们哈d to break convention. Most tea packages call for a steeping time of 3 to 5 minutes, but we found that a full 8 minutes produced a much better-tasting cup, especially once we added the requisite dash of milk and sugar. Of all the teas we sampled, Teapigs Morning Glory was our favorite for its robust, nutty, well-rounded flavor.

BUY IT:Teapigs Morning Glory English Breakfast Tea, $28 for 50 mesh sachet "temples" at Amazon,$7 for 15 mesh sachet "temples" at Thrive Market, or$15 for 250 grams of loose tea at Teapigs.com

For our full breakfast tea taste-test results, including amild pickand afloral pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Cottage Cheese:Friendship

This taste test surprised us the most—not because the winner, Friendship, was such a shocker, but because we had no ideahow enjoyable it would beto sample 13 varieties of cottage cheese. Friendship presented a cottage cheese that was thick with curds, but had a milky dressing that made it taste deliciously rich.

BUY IT:Friendship Dairies 4% California-Style Small-Curd Cottage Cheese, $2 for 8 ounces at AmazonFresh

For our full cottage cheese taste-test results, including anorganic pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Hummus:Tribe

Tribe Classic Hummus is wonderfully creamy—but nottoocreamy, as other hummus contenders proved to be. It's thick enough that it won't fall off your cracker at snack time, but it also easily spreads into alast-minute dinner bowl. It has a noticeable savory kick, with herbal undertones and a lemony—but not overly sharp—finish.

BUY IT:Tribe Classic Hummus, $2 for a 10-ounce container at Jet.com

For our hummus taste test results, including anorganic pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Cheese Tortellini:Rana

We dove into the savory side of the freezer aisle by tasting prepared tortellini. But we didn't stop at the freezer. We compared those brands to brands found in the refrigerator section as well as the dry pasta aisle. Ultimately, we found a refrigerator brand that none of us had ever tried, but is nowforever on all of our shopping lists. If you're the kind of person who does a weekly bulk buy though, don't worry. You can easily store Giovanni Rana in your freezer when you get home if you don't plan to eat it within a few days.

BUY IT:Giovanni Rana Cheese-Lovers Signature Tortellini, $5.50 for a 10-ounce package at FreshDirect

For our full tortellini taste-test results, including ashelf-stable pick, clickhere.

Our Favorite Chocolate Ice Cream:Naturally Friendly's

While our chocolate ice cream taste test revealed a top pick for both dark chocolate and milk chocolate lovers, our ultimate winner was more middle-of-the-road. A chocolate ice cream for everyone, Naturally Friendly's is well-priced, richly flavored, creamy, airy, and luscious.

BUY IT:Naturally Friendly's Premium Chocolate Ice Cream, $5 for 1 1/2 quarts on Instacart

For our full chocolate ice cream taste-test results, including those milk and dark picks, clickhere.

Vanilla Ice Cream

In our largest landslide of the year, Blue Bunny took home the title of best vanilla ice cream. But be warned: the brand has several varieties of vanilla. The one that we liked is the "vanilla bean" flavor that comes in a plastic tub. Other vanillas from Blue Bunny, including the vanilla beanpint, are filled with stabilizers that we did not like in other brands. Get the right one, and thank us later.

BUY IT:Blue Bunny Vanilla Bean Ice Cream, $3.50 for a 48-ounce tub in store at Wal-Mart

For our full vanilla ice cream taste-test results, clickhere.

Talenti

We took some time out this year to taste every flavor of Talenti gelatos and sorbets. All 36. It was a lot to eat in one afternoon. The winner: Mediterranean Mint—what is perhaps the best mint-chip ice cream you can find in nearly any store.

BUY IT:Talenti Mediterranean Mint Gelato, $5.50 per pint at AmazonFresh

To find out where your favorite fell on our list, clickhere.

All products featured on Epicurious are independently selected by our editors. If you buy something through our retail links, we may earn a small affiliate commission.