Joy comes from connecting with other people, especially when you get to participate in their special moments, like my recent opportunity to contribute a vegetable grazing board to the menu for a 95th birthday party. The instructions for the board are below, and highlights from the party follow.
My Grazing Board was a Learning Opportunity
I’ve been making different vegetable platters and charcuterie boards / smorgasbords for years (check them out here), but they tend to be rather random in terms of the plating. I was more deliberate with the design of this one, because our friends are so special and I wanted to honor this milestone birthday. I chose a larger board than usual, one that my father made for me which had been propped against the wall as a decorative item in my studio where I stashed it during the Big Glover Gardens Kitchen Remodel Project. That’s the board in the picture below from a few years ago. The studio has changed a bit since then, but the board has stayed in the same static position, gathering dust. I was so used to it being there that I had forgotten it had an actual functional purpose.
I had been rooting around through my giant collection of platters and couldn’t find anything right for this special grazing board, and then just happened to be in the studio, and voila! The handmade grazing platter with its food-safe chalkboard surface spoke to me. “Use me as I was intended, Kim,” it said. “I was never meant to be a decorative item, hidden away from the action up in your studio.“
It was right! I dusted it off and put it back into circulation, and through this process, I learned something: using a bigger platter made it much easier to make a pretty grazing board. This beautiful board that Dad made years ago measures 19 x 25 inches, or about 1½ x 2 feet in usable area within the raised-edge border. The rectangular shape with the flat bottom was also a benefit as opposed to my large, white oval platter, making it easier to place larger containers on it and still have room for vegetables.
Another thing I learned was to be more deliberate with where and how things are placed. I chose various round bowls and a basket and put them on the board first as anchors, then arranged the vegetables around them, being strategic with the colors.
The last thing was to fill in the spaces with herbs. I was really happy with the way it turned out—creative and attractive, but not overly fussy, and not so perfectly arranged that guests were afraid to touch it. 😁
Ingredients
- 1 pint grape tomatoes
- 2 tbsp. chimichurri (homemade or purchased)
- 2 cups total of green olives, kalamata olives, cornichons and cocktail onions
- 1 tbsp. olive oil
- 2 tsp. red wine vinegar
- 1 tsp. Zippy Sicilian or your favorite Italian spice mix
- 1 bunch green onions, trimmed
- ½ lb. broccoli crowns, cut into bite-sized pieces
- 3 large carrots, cut on the bias into ¼” thick slices
- ¼ head of cauliflower, cut into bite-sized pieces
- ½ lb. sugar snap peas
- Red and yellow bell peppers, cut into strips
- ¼ lb. radishes, cut in half lengthwise, with stems attached
- 1 cup assorted fresh herbs (parsley, oregano, basil, thyme, rosemary)
- 2 dips of your choice that go well with vegetables (see Notes)
- Crackers (everything crackers are a good choice)
Instructions
Gather your serving dishes: a large rectangular serving board and five serving dishes for the dips, olive mixture, tomatoes and crackers. They don’t all have to match, but should be in a similar style. I chose various blue pottery, and used a small round basket for the crackers. Place toothpicks in one or two small ramekins or egg cups.
Arrange the serving dishes on the platter as anchors, with one in each corner and one in the middle. Put the toothpicks between the anchors. Arrange the fresh vegetables around the anchor bowls or baskets, being careful to distribute the colors. Tuck fresh herbs around the vegetables.
Toss the tomatoes with the chimichurri in a small bowl. Combine the olives, cornichons and cocktail onions with the olive oil, red wine vinegar and Zippy Sicilian (or Italian seasoning) in another small bowl and stir. Transfer them to their serving bowls on the grazing platter when you are ready to serve, and fill the other two bowls with the dips you’ve chosen. Add the crackers to their bowl or basket. Scatter fresh herb leaves atop the dips and on their stems across the platter to fill in the spaces. Radishes look great in the corners.
Serving Notes
My recommendation for dips and spreads was generic, because there are endless possibilities that would be great on a platter like this. On that day, I created two new dips:
- one with artichoke hearts, marinated cherry peppers, goat cheese and a few other things (recipe TBD, I promise)
- another with white beans, Zippy Sicilian, lemon and other yummy goodness, which is almost a white bean hummus (recipe in the post below)
Hummus of any kind would be good on this grazing board, and if you use it, put a little swirl of good-quality olive oil atop it before serving, as I did with the white bean spread in the photo above. Other dips I would recommend from the Glover Gardens recipe archives are:
Highlights from the Party
Hopefully, it’s clear that I was beyond delighted to be a small part of this very special person’s birthday celebration. His name is Dewey and he’s a rock star of a human. Warm and witty, wise and wonderful, bright and experienced in love and life, Dewey is a person you want to sit down and talk with for hours when you meet him.
My vegetable board was just one part of the spread in the parlor at a local Presbyterian church.
Dewey was celebrated and serenaded, and the stories were as long and lush as his illustrious life.
I also had the opportunity to use my “real” camera, and snapped the pic below of Dewey with his adoring wife, a remarkable powerhouse of a person herself.
Many happy returns, Dewey!
© Glover Gardens
