How to Style a Charcuterie Board and How to Cut Cheese

If I could only eat one thing for the rest of my life I’m pretty sure it would be charcuterie. It’s hands down my favorite meal and my go-to thing to bring to parties. This holiday season I’ve partnered with Harvest Snaps to show you how you can create your own stunning meat and cheese board at home.

Whether you’re hosting Christmas dinner next week or heading to a friend’s house for New Year’s Eve, a charcuterie board is a great thing to serve. You can customize the items to your guests liking and when you arrange it so pretty it’s sure to be a hit.

Watch my video below to see how to style your own charcuterie board!

To add some crunch and more flavor to the board, I added Light Salted and Habanero Harvest Snaps. The Lightly Salted add just the perfect amount of salty flavor and the Habanero punch a big kick in a tiny bite. You can easily swap out these flavors for any of your favorite snaps—Onion Thyme or Black Pepper would also go great!

How to Style a Charcuterie Board

1. Start with a board. You can purchase a paddle-shaped cheese board or use a bamboo cutting board, like I have. Another option is to start with a rectangular board and add your own leather handles.
2. Cut the cheese. Yep, that’s the first part. I like to stick with one soft, one semi-soft, one strong flavored and one everyone is sure to love. For this board I went with Brie (soft), smoked gouda (semi-soft), blue (strong flavored), and extra sharp cheddar (everyone likes cheddar). A lot of people opt to place whole blocks of cheese on the board. While it looks pretty, I find that no one really eats the cheese when you do this. I opt to cut the cheese into bite-sized pieces instead as it encourages people to dig in. Be sure to watch the video above to learn how to cut them (and I also have more info about how to cut other cheeses here).
3. Add meats. If you’re planning on doing cheese only, skip this step. Otherwise start with adding the meat. For thin sliced meats, like prosciutto, I like to fold it like an accordion. Salami can be arranged like tiny shingles on a roof.
4. Add small dishes. Use small bowls to hold olives and pickles. Add a layer for sweet by adding honey or jam. My favorite is fig jam—it goes great with Brie and goat cheeses.
5. Plate the cheese. After adding the bowls arrange the cut cheeses around the board.
6. Add large fruit. Grapes are a staple but you could also do slices of fresh pear and apples. Just be sure to coat them with fresh lemon juice otherwise they will look brown and not-so-appetizing real quick.
7. Add Harvest Snaps. Add a layer of crunch and flavor by arranging your favorite flavors of Harvest Snaps on the board.
8. Garnish with fresh herbs. While no one is actually going to eat them, a little bit of fresh herbs and other greenery like lemon leaves go a long way. For the holidays I like to use fresh rosemary springs because they look like pine branches.
9. Top with dried fruits. My staples are candied orange slices (can be purchased ready-made at Trader Joe’s) and dried apricots. Dried or fresh cherries are tasty too.
10. Fill in the gaps with nuts. My favorite are Marcona almonds but anything can go here—well anything but peanuts—because we’re going for fancy presentation and not game day spread.