Whether you’re planning date night or grabbing your best girl friends for a Galentine’s Day brunch, these bite-sized Valentine’s Day charcuterie cups are and easy way to elevate your celebration.
In this article, I’ll guide you on how to create these effortlessly charming charcuterie cups. Get ready to impress your loved ones with a handheld treat that combines flavors, textures, and the essence of love in every delicious bite!
Valentine’s Day Charcuterie Cups
I love making charcuterie cups. They’re portable cups of goodness that are easy to carry around, and you can make as many or as few as you want.
Typically, charcuterie consists of meats, cheeses, fruit, nuts, and lots of other small food accompaniments. For these Valentine’s Day charcuterie cups, lean into pink and red for the holiday, along with any special candy or themed food that you can only get during this time of year.
I used these charcuterie paper cups and food picks.
These Valentine’s Day cups are so cute, and they take only a few minutes to assemble.
Ingredients for Making Charcuterie Cups
Here are the ingredients I used to make these Valentine’s Day charcuterie cups:
- Conversation hearts candy
- Heart shaped gummies
- Chocolate dipped pretzel rods
- Salami
- Raspberries
- Manchego cheese
- Strawberries
- Mini Valentine’s Day frosted cookies
Other than the cheese, I stuck with ingredients in the same color palette of pink and red to really show off the Valentine’s Day theme.
Other Ingredient Ideas
- Pepperoni
- Prosciutto
- White cheddar cheese
- Asiago cheese
- Mozarella
- Baby brie bites
- Mini Babybel cheese
- Cherry tomatoes
- Blackberries
- Cherries
- Figs
- Red grapes
- Chocolate covered almonds
- Hershey’s kisses
- Chocolate truffles
- Chocolate covered mini pretzels
- Dove chocolate hearts
- Valentine’s Day M&Ms
How to Make Individual Charcuterie Cups
1. Grab Your Ingredients
To make these charcuterie cups, it’s easier to lay out and prep ingredients first, like slicing cheese or stacking food onto food picks.
From there, work in an assembly-line fashion to place a single ingredient in all cups before moving onto the next ingredient. This ensures that every cup you make will have everything in it.
2. Start With a Base
Fill your Valentine’s Day charcuterie cups with a base so that the remaining items can peek out and don’t get stuck at the bottom of the cup.
For these cups, I added a handful of conversation hearts, then stacked everything else on top of them. Use any small food ingredient like m&ms, small candies, or nuts.
3. Think About Presentation
Just like there’s an art to assembling a beautiful charcuterie board, there’s an art to filling individual charcuterie cups.
For meats, fold multiple slices and stack them onto a single food pick, or roll up a slice of salami to full an open gap.
You want your charcuterie cups to look abundant, but also be easy to eat. Food picks solve this issue. They look nice when placed upright in your charcuterie cup, and are easy to grab so your guests wont have to dig into their cup with their hands.
If your cup feels like it’s lagging something, use a small garnish like a single spray rose or baby’s breath as a nod to a traditional Valentine’s Day flower bouquet.
Charcuterie Cup FAQs
How far in advance should I prep my Valentine’s Day charcuterie cups?
Although I like to prep things in advance when possible, these charcuterie cups should only be assembled as early as two house in advance. Otherwise, you risk your meat and cheese drying out. As a rule of thumb, try not to prep your cups more than two hours in advance so they stay fresh.
The good news is that these charcuterie cups don’t take long at all to assemble and come together in minutes.
If you want, cut any cheese ahead of time and wash any fruit, then store them properly in airtight containers until you’re ready for them.
What is the best way to store Valentines’ Day charcuterie cups?
Store your charcuterie cups in the refrigerator until you’re ready to serve them. This will keep them cold and fresh.
How long can charcuterie stay out?
To avoid meats and cheeses from drying out, and to avoid potential bacterial growth, charcuterie cups should never sit out longer than four hours. If they do, you’ll want to dispose of any leftovers.
If you try these Valentine’s Day charcuterie cups, please be sure to let me know in the comments section! I can’t wait to hear how they turn out.
