Once a hamper goes over €150, it is going to feel generous before the recipient has taken anything out of it. The size settles that. What it does not settle is whether the gift feels considered or simply big. A large selection can read as a lot of thought, or as a lot of money, and the two are not the same thing. At this level that is the line we are working to, not how much to put in, but whether everything in it has a reason to be there.

What Size Cannot Do on Its Own

Over €150 there is room for almost anything, and that is the difficulty rather than the freedom. The easy move is to keep adding, because a hamper that is simply full still looks impressive at first glance. Adding is not the same as putting something together, though, and the gap between the two is what separates a considered gift from a large one. So on any hamper in our range over €150, the thing worth checking is whether the size is covering for the selection rather than coming from it.

The test is a plain one. Look at a finished hamper and ask whether you could take items out of it without the selection losing its shape. If you can, those items were padding, there to fill the space the price opened up. If you cannot, each part is holding something else in place, and the size is the result of a decision rather than the point of it. It works the same way whether a hamper costs a little over €150 or several times that.

What gives a large selection its shape is structure more than number. A run of sweet things, however good each one is, starts to blur once there are enough of them. A savoury thread underneath gives those sweet items something to work against, and a reason to be reached for in a particular order. A bottle of wine has to earn its place against the food rather than simply adding to the drink. The larger the hamper, the more it leans on these load-bearing parts, because there is more to keep from falling into a pile.

Two things follow from that. The first is that the harder discipline at this level is leaving things out, not finding more to put in, and we more often than not find ourselves deciding what a hamper is better without. The second is that the size should answer the occasion. A hamper this large suits a moment that genuinely calls for it, so the scale reads as fitting rather than as reaching for effect. None of this counts against a smaller gift, which has its own job to do well. It is only that over €150 the particular risk is size standing in for thought, and that is the one worth guarding against.

Great Taste Award Silver Duo Hamper (€169.65)

The Silver Duo Hamper sits just past the start of the band, and it is the first point where a second bottle becomes part of the gift. The decision it has to get right is whether two bottles make the hamper more considered or only heavier. A red and a white give a couple or a household something for more than one evening and more than one taste, but that only works if the food around them holds its weight. The selection leans sweet, so the savoury side is what stops the wine sitting on its own.

Take the chutney, the oatcakes and the olives out and the two bottles are left holding up a box of chocolate and cake. Leave them in and the wine has something to be opened alongside, and the sweet items stop being the whole of it. That difference is already there at the entry of the band. The bottles are not there to push the gift over a price, they are held in place by what they are meant to be drunk with.

Betty M. sent one as a gift and described the reaction when the food and the two bottles arrived together.

“beautifully presented and packed full of fab food and wine. didn't dissapoint and the recipients were blown away by it. would def reccomend”

-Betty M.

Great Taste Award Platinum Hamper (€270.31)

The Platinum Hamper carries no wine, only food, and that makes the test sharper rather than easier. With this many items there is every chance of the hamper becoming a long run of sweet things that blur into one another. What keeps it from that is a savoury spine built through the middle of it, so the chocolate and the baked goods have something to break against instead of simply piling up. It is the kind of selection where the harder choice is what to leave out.

The Carrigaline cheese, the Lecale Harvest pâté and the Silver and Green olives are the parts doing that work, with the Fenner's biltong adding a savoury note you would not expect in a hamper this sweet. Take them out and a generous box remains, but it loses its centre and reads as a lot of one thing. Keep them in and the size has a structure, because every sweet item now sits in relation to a savoury one. Of the three, it is the plainest case, large, food only, and held together by a few items you could not take out without it falling flat.

Emily D. did not see the hamper herself and passed on what her mother made of it.

“Although I didn't see the hamper, the feedback from my mum was glowing. She was really impressed with the presentation and variety of products, so thank you.”

-Emily D.

Great Taste Award Diamond Hamper (€326.46)

At the top of the range the Diamond Hamper is at its biggest, and that is where the test bites hardest. It holds more than thirty items, and at that size the easy failure is repetition, more of the same sweet register until the quantity is the only thing left to notice. What stops it is a fuller version of the structure used lower down, set alongside a few items that are genuinely different in kind, so the breadth reads as range rather than as more of the same.

The cheese, the Foods of Athenry sodabread toasts, the pâté and the chutney make a proper savoury board rather than a single thread, and items such as the Skelligs Six18 gin truffle and the dark chocolate covered figs give the selection edges it would not have as a larger pile of the usual things. Take those out and the size starts to feel like volume. Keep them in and the scale answers a genuinely large occasion, the kind that warrants a gift this substantial, instead of using size to make an impression. At the very top, that is what considered comes down to. Not the largest hamper that could be packed, but the largest one where nothing is in it only to make it bigger.

David M. has ordered the larger hampers more than once and summed up what his grandmother made of this one.

“Always left more than satisfied with your amazing hampers. My nan loved this, got so much value for your money. Thank you”

-David M.

For as long as Basketsgalore Ireland has been putting together gift hampers, the standard has been the same, that a hamper is worth what its contents are worth and how well they have been put together, not how much has been packed in. Some of the producers in these hampers are small enough that even the London food halls cannot get them, which is part of what makes a selection worth sending rather than just worth its weight. That is why, over €150, the size takes care of itself, and the gift is really the part you could not take out without the rest falling short.

Published: June 2026 

Author: Amy