Spread Cheer at Holiday Gatherings with a Christmas Charcuterie Board

The holidays are a time for gathering with loved ones and indulging in delicious bites, and nothing brings these elements together quite like a Christmas charcuterie board. Beautiful charcuterie spreads can appeal to every guest, whether they enjoy savory meats and cheeses or sweet peppermint bark and cookies, and we’re all about using different charcuterie board ideas to wow our guests and make entertaining a little bit easier. 

Why Create a Charcuterie Board this Holiday Season?

Whether you need an appetizer to serve at a swanky cocktail party or an ornament exchange gathering, charcuterie boards are a perfect option. With a vibrant mix of cheeses, meats, fruits, nuts, and even holiday-themed treats, a charcuterie board can be a stunning display that adds festive spirit and bold flavors to your table. A Christmas charcuterie board encourages guests to graze and chat, making it ideal for a Christmas gathering where we want everyone to mingle. 

If your guests prefer a traditional board with savory meats and cheeses, a plant-based option with vegetables and nuts, or a sweet board with chocolates and fruits, you can tailor your charcuterie board to match everyone’s preferences. We also love to lean into the produce of the season, referring to Brightland’s Instagram for produce guides to choose the best and freshest fruits to display on our board.  

Charcuterie boards are also a minimal-stress, high-impact way to serve food. With just a bit of intentional arrangement, yours can appear gourmet. In reality, a Christmas charcuterie board doesn’t involve any baking or cooking, so you don’t have to plan oven timing or account for things getting cold {just prepare your knife skills}.

 

Planning your Christmas Charcuterie Board

 

The first step to creating your Christmas charcuterie board is to plan – the best ones have a clear design and execution. It’s much easier to craft a beautiful Christmas charcuterie board if you know what you want it to look like and what feeling you want it to have. 

We love to look up charcuterie board ideas and find inspiration online, on Instagram, or on Pinterest. There are so many fun and festive charcuterie board ideas out there, and it is amazing to see what can be created. 

After you have your vision, build your ingredient list, keeping in mind any dietary restrictions your guests might have. It’s important to plan out specialty ingredients you might want to get from special stores or any props you plan to use on the board. 

 

 

Choosing your Charcuterie Foods

 

When choosing foods for your charcuterie board, aim to balance flavors, textures, and colors so it looks and {more importantly} tastes good. If you are making a traditional charcuterie board, begin with your cured meats and cheeses, then add accompaniments that complement and contrast. 

While charcuterie boards, by definition, contain a combination of meats and cheeses, you can adapt yours to feature desserts, breakfast, or other foods and snacks on your board. 

• Traditional Board – Try mixing thinly sliced meats like prosciutto or bresaola and thicker cuts of small salami on your board to have some variety and texture. You can have different types of hard and soft cheeses alongside nuts, crackers, or breads that elevate the charcuterie board. You can also add fresh or dried fruits, honey, or fig jam for sweetness on your board and olives or pickles for a more savory bite. 
• Cocktail Board – Designed to complement and elevate whatever your cocktail menu is, a cocktail board features snack items that pair well with specific drinks. These boards often include foods like savory nuts, marinated olives, artisan cheeses, and fresh or dried fruits, as they provide a balance of flavors to enhance each sip.
• Grazing Board – While charcuterie boards can come in many sizes, a grazing board is extra-large and filled with an assortment of bite-sized foods for casual snacking and sharing. Grazing boards encourage guests to sample a variety of flavors and textures throughout the gathering, featuring cheeses, meats, fruits, vegetables, dips, and nuts that they can keep coming back to. 
• Crudités Board – A crudité platter is an elevated vegetable tray filled with an assortment of fresh, raw vegetables and dips or spreads. It is a vegetable-forward option to include among your charcuterie boards, perfect for pairing with boards that boast meats and cheeses or standing on its own to bring freshness to the table. We love to make a crudité platter with lemon Greek dressing {and our guests love eating it}.

 

 

Holiday-Inspired Charcuterie Foods

Bring holiday flair to any Christmas charcuterie board with these options:

• Small Christmas cookies
• Peppermint bark
• Roasted nuts
• Cheeses in Christmas tree shapes {use a cookie cutter}
• Star shaped salami
• Any red, white, and green foods
• Gingerbread
• Rosemary sprigs

 

 

The 3-3-3-3 Charcuterie Board Rule

A good rule of thumb to follow when crafting your Christmas charcuterie board is the 3-3-3-3 rule. This means that your board should have three types of meat, three types of cheese, three types of starches, and three extra accompaniments {like fruits or nuts}. Anything else you add is a welcome addition, so include what you think will maximize your Christmas charcuterie board. 

 

 

Alternative Charcuterie Board Ideas

 

 

Break away from the traditional charcuterie board and try out a fun, festive charcuterie board idea this holiday season. Your offerings don’t just need to be appetizers; you can get creative and come up with new ideas for all sorts of merry fun. 

• Hot Chocolate Board – A hot chocolate charcuterie board is a fun, cozy twist on the traditional charcuterie board centered around building the ultimate hot chocolate experience. It includes a variety of toppings, mix-ins, and treats to let guests customize their perfect cup of hot cocoa. Try including different kinds of marshmallows, sprinkles, candy canes, cocoa powder, cinnamon, and whipped cream on or around your board ( make sure to have COCO Chocolatier drinking chocolate on hand).

Pro Tip: Offer whole milk and dairy-free milk to accommodate most guests.

• Dessert Board – This charcuterie board idea is a sweet take on the traditional charcuterie board, focusing on a variety of treats, candies, fruits, and dessert items. It’s perfect for anyone with a sweet tooth and a fantastic addition to the dessert table. We love to include smaller cookies and bars that can be stacked and layered, as well as chocolates and truffles. Amp up the Christmas spirit of this charcuterie board idea with candied nuts and gumdrops or candy canes, feel free to also add fresh fruit.  
• Breakfast or Brunch Board - For your Christmas morning gathering, you could include mini bagels, croissants, and muffins alongside spreads like cream cheese, butter, honey, and jam. Fresh fruits such as berries and orange slices can add freshness, while hard-boiled eggs, smoked salmon, prosciutto, and cheeses bring a savory element to the board. Yogurt cups, granola, and nuts can offer crunch and additional variety.

 

Charcuterie Board Shapes for the Holidays

Since charcuterie boards are all about display, it can be especially striking to play around with fun and festive shapes when making a Christmas charcuterie board. Shaping your Christmas charcuterie board into a holiday symbol is fun to do and extra impactful. 

Here are some charcuterie board ideas that you can use to shape yours:

• Tree – To create a festive Christmas tree board that can be pulled apart and eaten, lay your charcuterie ingredients in rows, making them go from wide at the bottom to narrow at a point at the top. Following the shape of a Christmas tree, you can slightly layer your rows on top of each other so there is a dimensional leaf effect. To make this charcuterie board idea pop even more, cut cheeses into star and ornament shapes and arrange them on top of your tree. 
• Wreath – For this charcuterie board idea, you can place mounds {for dimension} of ingredients around in a wreath shape, framing them with some rosemary sprigs or basil leaves, complete with salami swirls for bows. You can also choose to skewer the ingredients to make little stacks and then place those in a wreath-like circle. 
• Santa – While this charcuterie board idea is up for interpretation, we find that the easiest way to make a Santa-themed Christmas charcuterie board is out of brie cheese. While you can create your Santa any way you want, we suggest placing a round of brie on your board, giving it a mozzarella ball beard, olive eyes, a cheesy mustache, a tomato nose, and a red hat {think salami, strawberries, or tomatoes}. 
• Candy Cane – One of our all-time favorite charcuterie board ideas is a candy cane caprese design. Simply cut tomatoes and mozzarella into discs and alternately layer them in the cane shape – voila, a Christmas charcuterie board that feasts your eyes and taste buds.

Charcuterie Boards, Trays, and Platters for Christmas

 

 

The backdrop of your Christmas charcuterie board will set the scene for your display and slowly peek out as guests pick out more bites. Typically, wooden serving boards are used, but trays or other large platters can also be great serveware choices for your spread.

• Balsam and Berry Round Handled Tray – Your guests will be delighted as they eat, with each bite revealing more of the “merry merry” message surrounded by our balsam and holly pattern. The round tray works beautifully with wreath-designed holiday charcuteries; as a bonus, the handles and raised sides make it convenient to bring as a dish to pass.
• Balsam and Berry Ruffle Skinny Tray – This skinny tray matches other Balsam and Berry styles or any red and green serveware. The size makes it perfect for crackers or olives and nuts to pick from, slowly revealing the festive design. 
• Nativity Platter – Perfect for a religious Christmas home, this larger platter can hold an assortment of charcuterie offerings. It pairs well with the rest of our O Holy Night Collection but also blends seamlessly with the Deco and Signature White Collections. 
• O Holy Night in Color Skinny Rectangle Tray – This skinny tray is a perfect option to line crackers or crusty breads on. This design features the three wise men on the go and a religious holiday mantra, with a color version bringing some vibrancy to your charcuterie spread or a neutral version, which pairs perfectly with your other serveware.
• O Holy Night Round Platter – This is a very large platter that can fit plenty of your charcuterie fixings. The detailed nativity design serves as a beautiful reminder of the reason for the season and pairs wonderfully with our other O Holy Night Collection serveware and dinnerware or any other white and gold dishes.  
• Christmas in the Village Tray – This festive tray features a flying Santa in classic Christmas colors that is perfect to incorporate into any holiday party spread. The size and shape make it an ideal vessel to layer a selection of specific charcuterie ingredients, like cheeses or meats, on.
• Christmas in the Village Rooftop Square Platter – This square platter is medium-sized and works great to hold appetizer bowls or cured meats. Depicting Santa on the roof of a mint green house, this design in our Christmas in the Village Collection works perfectly with other designs that feature pastel, vintage-inspired holiday designs. 
• Christmas in the Village Platter – This is another very large platter that can function as a round base for a whole charcuterie board. Pairing well with the rest of our Christmas in the Village Collection, it features Santa flying over a vintage holiday village with a cheery saying. 

Appetizer Bowls for your Charcuterie Display

Dips, nuts, olives, and other charcuterie accompaniments deserve a special spot on your Christmas charcuterie board. Try placing appetizer bowls in your charcuterie spread to incorporate them seamlessly into your Christmas charcuterie board. 

• O Holy Night Appetizer Bowl – This small-sized appetizer bowl comes from our O Holy Night Collection and pairs beautifully with other designs from the collection or white and gold serveware. This bowl is ideal for holding any condiments, nuts, or fruits to make a functional yet beautiful display on your board. 
• Christmas in the Village Appetizer Bowl – This is a small appetizer bowl ideal for things like dipping sauces, nuts, specialty oils, and other condiments for your charcuterie board. It features our vintage, pastel Christmas in the Village design with a pop of cherry red on the inside to match any other colorful and festive décor and serveware. 
• Balsam and Berry Ruffle Appetizer Bowl – This small-sized appetizer bowl features the red and green Balsam and Berry pattern, making it perfect for incorporating into a red and green-themed serveware spread. It works great to hold liquids like olive oil for dipping or jams and spreads on crackers or bread. 
• Balsam and Berry Holly Wooden Dough Bowl – This bowl is made of sustainable mango wood and has an enameled inside that is merry and festive to the max. This long bowl features our beloved Balsam and Berry pattern and is ideal for holding bread slices {like our favorite beer bread} to complement your charcuterie board. 

 

Festive Christmas Charcuterie Accessories

To take your Christmas charcuterie setup to the next level, consider styling it with adorable accessories to make grazing easier for guests. You can include Christmas-themed utensils and accessories that enhance the holiday experience and make it feel extra festive. 

• Balsam and Berry Toothpick Holder – This cute, tree-shaped toothpick holder adds extra merriment to your charcuterie board and adds a functional touch. This design is made in a neutral color palette, so it can blend seamlessly with other colors on the board. 
• Standing Santa Toothpick Holder – Depicting the jolly man himself, this toothpick holder is painted white, so it can stand alone or with our other toothpick options. It is a versatile holder for guests who want to skewer cheese and olives with ease.

• Red Bengal Stripe Appetizer Spreader – Another way to add some festivity to your charcuterie board, this spreader features a ceramic and metal design and vibrant red and white stripes along the handle. It’s great for spreading soft cheeses and jellies or jams. Add multiple to the table to suit your needs. 

Cocktail Napkins Pair Perfectly with Charcuterie Boards

While your Christmas charcuterie board is the main event, it’s good to have cocktail napkins on hand to keep hands and furniture clean. Why not add some festive cocktail napkins to your spread to play into the fun and festivity of the season? 

Flying Santa Cocktail Napkins Set – This classy yet festive cocktail napkin set features an emerald green border that fits perfectly with any neutral or holiday-colored décor or serveware. Set these napkins next to your charcuterie board for easy cleanups. 

As the holiday season unfolds, there is no better treat for your guests than a Christmas charcuterie board. Whether you opt for a traditional board with cured meats and cheeses or a non-traditional breakfast or dessert one, your creation will become the highlight of the gathering. Gather your favorite ingredients, unleash your creativity, and let your Christmas charcuterie board bring joy and cheer to all.