If you’re looking to wow your guests or friends at your next get together, how about a dessert dip charcuterie board? Charcuterie boards are super-popular these days, and making one with dessert dips is perfect for grazing! Keep reading to learn how to put one together, tips for presentation, and easy shortcuts! Perfect for Girl’s Night, holiday brunches like Easter and Mother’s Day, bridal and baby showers, graduation party – any occasion is really perfect!
Dessert Dips for a Crowd
When it comes to get-togethers, I’m the one making the easiest dish. If it’s for a whole dinner menu, I’m bringing dessert. If it’s desserts, I’m bringing the easiest dessert. My go-to is usually trifles (if that’s typically you, too, you can check out 60+ of the best trifle recipes!), but I’ve recently wandered into the land of dessert dips, and they are probably easier than trifles and they work for any season. I know you can bring a trifle any time of year, but my mind typically goes to summertime with trifles.
I brought an amazing cannoli dessert dip one year to my sister’s house for Christmas, but lately I’ve been playing with charcuterie boards, and I thought, ‘Why not several dessert dips?’ They are so easy to make, and it definitely is designed to impress.
OK, so let’s talk about some of the basics of putting together a dessert dip charcuterie board.
How to Build a Charcuterie Board with Dessert Dips
This post may contain affiliate links. See Disclosures for details.
Preparations
1| Figure out how many dessert dips you want to make
That is your first step. The way I did this was to get out my board, find some glass or plastic mini-bowls to serve the dessert dips in (you can even get them at Dollar Tree!), and then arrange them on the charcuterie board to see how many I needed.
For the size of my board, which is 14″ round, 5 dessert dips seemed like a good amount to make.
2| Decide on your dessert dips
I did a little research for what dessert dips I could make and came across this article, which, to me, is Grand Puba for dessert dips.
I scrolled through, did my best to narrow it down (trust me, that was the hardest part!) and I went to work.
You’ll want to read through the steps and ingredients. Most are pretty easy and use similar ingredients (cream cheese, Cool Whip, powdered sugar). However, there are some that are more complicated or use a larger variety of ingredients.
I suggest picking a few dessert dips that use the same ingredients, just for the sake of ease and a simple shopping list.
{If you want to try some healthier versions of dessert dips, there are many skinny varieties of all the good stuff – you can find 30 light and skinny dessert dips right here! And to be honest, you can easily swap out some ingredients in the other recipes for their light, low-fat or sugar-free counterparts to skinny them up.}
My final choices were:
You want to choose a nice mix for all sorts of tastes. You can find the recipes for all of these dessert dips plus more to choose from (I plan on doing round 2 in the near future!) right here.
3| Create your shopping list
After you’ve decided on the dessert dips you want, create a shopping list.
Here’s an important distinction when making a dessert board versus just making one dessert dip: you are going to HALF the recipes. To make a full serving is going to be a LOT of dessert dip. You can half the recipe, therefore halving your ingredients. Keep that in mind when making your shopping list.
So, if 2 recipes call for 8 oz . of cream cheese, you really only need to by 1 8oz. package because you are going to use 4 oz. in each.
Don’t forget you also need to buy the food you are going to use to scoop the dip. This is purely personal, but here are some ideas of what I used when I made my board:
Sliced apples
Grapes
Strawberries
Pretzels or pretzel chips
Pita chips
Broken up waffle cones
Graham Crackers
Nilla Wafers
Chocolate bars
4| Make your dips ahead of time
Probably the day before you are going to serve, have a marathon session of dip-making. You’ll want to let them chill anyway, and it’s too stressful to make them the day-of.
I put the dips in mini bowls (note: you’ll still probably have more dip than you need, even with the recipes cut in half), covered with Saran wrap, and wrote the name of the dip on the wrap with a Sharpie.
Assembling the Dessert Dip Board
OK, the big day is here! Here’s how I went about setting up my board.
1| First, once again, put out your bowls so you know how to arrange your other food items.
See the above picture for reference. Just even space them out, depending on how many dips you’re making.
2| Figure out how many different items you are going to lay out on your board and do the math of how to distribute them evenly on your board.
For example, on my board, I had 4 bowls around the perimeter and one in the center. That basically left me with 4 different zones for food. I had chosen 8 different items, so that meant I needed to fit 2 items per zone.
3| Lay out your food by similar colors first
Many of my food choices were in the brownish family (pretzels, pita chips, Nilla wafers). You’ll want spread those out as much as possible, so you can evenly distribute the color. If you have some that are going to have to be side by side, try to place the ones with the biggest color contrast next to each other.
4| Add in your contrasting color food
Now, you want to add in the foods that have the brighter colors – that will probably be your fruits (apples, berries, grapes), unless you’re doing a holiday board, which tends to have bright holiday treats to include.
5| Finally, put out your dessert dips
You want to use the same method for this. Try to separate your similar colors as much as possible. For example, if you have a Nutella or Fluffernutter dip, try to place that near the brighter fruit colors. If you have a dessert dip with sprinkles, place that near the more bland-colored pretzels or graham crackers.
The idea is to have bright pops of colors throughout the entire board.
Optional: Identifying Place Cards
You can also include mini place cards identifying the flavor of the dip. You might be tight for space, so you can place those cards on the table, on the outer edges of the boards near the corresponding dip.
I made one for friends, so I didn’t bother. I knew they’d eat it, no matter what.
Transporting the Board
If you are going to be bringing this to someone’s house for a party or get together, here are a few pro-tips, as this doesn’t really travel well.
Your safest bet it to assemble the board once you’re arrived, unless you have someone in your car who can hold it very still or you can place it in a box. But even still, covering the board during transport is a challenge, too.
To transport your dips, you can bring bowls covered in wrap and then just fluff them up once you arrive. You can also put them in a disposable cupcake tin and scoop them into bowls once you’re there.
For your food items, you can divvy them up into Ziplock bags and bring them with you. That’s easier than bringing the full boxes or bags. You can also bring the fruit in some plastic containers.
Once you’re there, follow the above steps to assemble. It really only takes about 10 minutes to do and can easily be done on site.
What Occasions Can I Make a Dessert Dip Charcuterie Board?
The better question might be “What occasion CAN’T I make a dessert dip board?” I definitely love the idea of this kind of board, and I think it’s so impressive for some many occasions:
Brunch
Easter Sunday
Mother’s Day
Bridal Shower
Baby Shower
Birthday Party
Anniversary Party
Graduation Party
Holiday Get-Togethers
Girls’ Night
It literally will be a hit no matter where and when you serve it.
Beyond the Dessert Dip Boards: Other Charcuterie Board Options
If you are looking for other ideas for charcuterie boards (to be fair, a traditional charcuterie board by definition means a board with cured meats, cheeses, fruit, crackers, and other French picnic type food), there are many spins on this. It has definitely evolved to mean any kind of snack board or platter.
If you are looking to create a family-friendly charcuterie board, this post has many family and kid-friendly tips for assembling it.
This post right here has 25 kid-specific grazing boards that you will not have to beg your kids to eat. They will love them, and there are ideas for just about any occasion.
This post has 30 brunch charcuterie board ideas, that go beyond just dessert.
And this is a fabulous Easter Candy & Dessert Board – and here’s a sweet and savory board for fall!
This is a delicious and easy bread charcuterie board with a variety of breads and spreads!
Charcuterie boards are definitely the way to go for impressing your guests in terms of presentation, variety and flavors! Give it a whirl!
More Dessert Ideas
If you need a few more ideas for desserts for your next party or get-together, you’re speaking my language!
Here are some more to try!
60+ of the Best Trifle Recipes
35+ Desserts Perfect for a Crowd
30 Single-Serving Desserts for a Party
If you try this dessert dip board or any of the other ideas, I’d love to see it! Tag me on Instagram @100affections!
Thoughts? I’d love to hear them! Leave a comment below!
Leave a Reply