Making The Perfect Charcuterie Boards by Chef Whitni

​I have to say, right off the bat, I love creating beautiful platters with food.
My grandmother says, “an artist paints on a canvas, you build a beautiful
masterpiece with food.”

When I’m getting ready to build a platter, whether it’s a meat and cheese board, veggie platter, cheese and fruit, or putting them all together on one: it all starts with ideas
in my head.

I choose colors I want to use, ingredients I want to incorporate, and the
design I want to implement. Even with all of these ideas in my head, I
really don’t know how it’s going to turn out until I get started, and sometimes
it turns out very different than the vision I had. 

The first thing I start with is what kind of platter do I want to use? Is it big or
small, how many people am I serving, and will I need additional containers on it to contain certain foods like spreads? Choose a platter that will compliment the foods on it. For example, cutting boards work well with meat and cheeses. TIP: cut up ingredients on a separate cutting board and then use a clean board as your serving platter to keep everything looking clean and fresh.

Once I have all the ingredients in front of me, I jump in and start building, cutting and designing. I add in the décor -  any greens or small dishes for particular items, making sure to use different shapes and sizes of all items fit together in an arrangement. Then, with that basic layout I begin adding in the foods starting with larger items (in quantity or size) and then go down through to smaller items that can fit in the gaps. Finally, adding any finishing touches like garnishes (fresh herbs or edible flowers).

In this particular charcuterie board, I have an olive cheese ball I made ahead of time, a hot brie dish, mini sesame cheese balls, some fruit, and pickled items, a variety of deli meats, a fig balsamic dipping sauce for bread pieces, some rosemary and nuts are always good to fill in spaces and accent the platter. Your platter should look so creative and beautiful that your guests don’t want to disturb it, they want to admire it, because “you eat with your eyes first.”