Charcuterie Boards Gain Popularity in Midst of Pandemic

By Maddi Dolan

When the world was sent home to quarantine for COVID-19, people found themselves binge-watching shows on Netflix, as well as eating and drinking like never before. It became a daily cycle of couch to kitchen. With ample time on their hands, people were given an opportunity to discover new foods and ways of eating.

With 15th century French origins, charcuterie boards have long been a part of social gatherings. But since lockdown in 2020, they have made a delicious and visually appealing comeback, becoming a massive trend on social media, and we may have to thank COVID-19 for that.

Michelle Avalos discovered her passion for charcuterie during lockdown last year. Located in Riverside, California, Avalos was working full time as a respiratory therapist in a hospital when the pandemic hit. With the stress of COVID and a negative work environment, Avalos wasn’t finding joy throughout the day, so she turned to charcuterie boards.

“Charcuterie became my creative outlet,” said Avalos. “It was a blessing.”

After watching countless video tutorials online, Avalos spent hours in the kitchen learning how to intricately fold salami and make flowers out of prosciutto. She kept practicing and learning new techniques until she got the hang of it.

Avalos started making boards for family and friends, posting photos on social media along the way. Her followers began reaching out to purchase them, and her business took off from there. She quit her job at the hospital and created the company, “Meatchee’se Boards,” where she sometimes sells a hundred charcuterie boards in a week.

“Charcuterie has been something that really brought positivity back into my life when I felt like there wasn’t any. It was a dark time,” said Avalos. “It’s funny how just the littlest things can bring joy to someone’s day, and this is something that did just that for me.”

While COVID sparked people’s initial interest and desire to try charcuterie boards, New York City Visual and Food Stylist, Alaura Berry, said we can also thank social media and the “aesthetically pleasing” aspect of charcuterie boards for their boom in popularity during lockdown.

“People love to eat things that look beautiful,” said Berry. “And charcuterie is a beautiful thing.”

Along with people's love for eating beautiful food, today people of all ages love to post photos of their aesthetically pleasing meals on social media. Berry explained that this trend was predominant throughout quarantine, during a time when people couldn’t gather together and eat elegantly plated meals in restaurants. They had to share their meals another way, so they chose the mantra “phone eats first.”

While people found charcuterie making to be a form of entertainment and a fun way to get creative in the kitchen, it also became a simple way to share something new online for others to see. People proudly posted their “food art” on social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook and Tiktok, furthering the charcuterie board trend.

“Charcuterie boards exploded on Instagram during lockdown,” said Berry. “And if something is popular and someone else sees that, they’re going to want it too.”

People all across the U.S began either purchasing charcuterie boards or making them at home. Along with watching video tutorials online, charcuterie blogger and Chicago native, Emily Delaney, also known as “The Cheese Board Queen” on social media, said people with well established charcuterie companies, like herself, started offering online classes during COVID, and they quickly gained popularity.

“I started doing virtual classes through Instagram,” said Delaney. “When COVID first hit, I was doing it on a weekly basis. It was a great way to connect with people during a time when people felt so disconnected.”

Avalos also started offering zoom workshops during COVID. After seeing other charcuterie accounts on Instagram host online events, she was inspired to do the same.

“It was such a good way to kind of bring people together without really bringing them together,” said Avalos. “It became so rewarding. So many people were able to get together and enjoy a glass of wine online and build boards together.”

Shannon Vega, Owner of “BoardYum” in Coral Springs, Florida, was inspired to create her own business after she herself took an online board making class during lockdown.

“I had always been into charcuterie boards, so I decided to purchase a virtual class for a group of my friends and I,” said Vega. “We did it and I just really enjoyed it. It stuck with me and one day I got to thinking and I just decided, I’m just going to go for it.”

Prior to COVID, Vega had been a destination wedding planner for 11 years. She explained that during a global pandemic, it’s a terrible profession to be in, so she took charcuterie making as an opportunity to stay busy, while continuing to make an income.

“When COVID hit, a lot of people either lost their jobs or were just at home bored,” said Berry. “A lot of people used charcuterie as an opportunity to start a business.”

Tiffanie Lubbers, owner of “Chucktown Cheese Boards,” turned her charcuterie hobby into a business after she was laid off from her job in March of 2020. During her time spent in quarantine, she did a lot of cooking. One night she decided to make a charcuterie board for her family to mix things up. With the left over ingredients, she made a small board for her neighbor. Her business took off soon after.

“My neighbor thought it was amazing, and she told me I should sell them,” said Lubbers. “I told her I could never sell them, nobody would buy them.”

After her encounter with the neighbor, she got to thinking. While scrolling through photos of different charcuterie board businesses on Instagram, she thought, “oh, I can totally do that.” She now works out of a commercial kitchen in Charleston, South Carolina, making charcuterie boards full time.

Berry, who had been in the charcuterie business a few years prior to COVID, said that she’s seen the charcuterie community quadruple since lockdown began.

“Even today, post lockdown, there are still a lot of charcuterie companies popping up,” said Berry. “It just keeps growing.”

Because so many newbies have joined the community over the past year and a half, charcuterie boards are now being redefined in the sense that they’re becoming much more than meats and cheeses. Food bloggers, business owners and people at home are all creating elaborately themed boards, like brunch boards, dessert boards and even vegan boards, that are trending all over Instagram and Tiktok.

“Social media and people’s creativity has really taken charcuterie to a whole ‘nother level,” said Lubbers.

Yes, technically charcuterie is a french phrase meaning “cooked meats,” but people are expanding this definition, all because they love colorful and aesthetically assembled foods on a wooden board.

“People are getting creative with different types of foods and are going out of the norm of what you would expect charcuterie to be,” said Avalos. “It's the aspect of beauty that people enjoy. The different colors and flavors, it really lights people up.”

Charcuterie is becoming much more about the presentation of the food, rather than the food itself. Delaney explained that a simple list of ingredients can transform into something special when you arrange them on a board.

“Take a traditional meal of waffles for example,” said Delaney. “Getting to build your own waffle board where you can add your own elements, be creative and present it in a really beautiful fashion just makes people so excited.”

Today, you can create a board out of anything. This is because charcuterie making has transformed into a true art form since the pandemic. Just like painting on a canvas, making a scrapbook, or sculpting clay, people are using their creativity to make something wonderful; intricately arranged charcuterie boards made with a variety of different ingredients.

“I think ingredients are an important element, but charcuterie has really become food art,” said Vega. “A huge part of it speaks to the artistry and the aesthetic rather than the actual items on the board.”

Delaney, who created her charcuterie blog to educate others on different products and styling tricks, says there are four main principles of styling a charcuterie board. The first principle is “variety.”

“Variety means the ingredients you have and how you present them,” Delaney explained. “Slicing cheeses and fruits in different ways adds variety.”

The next principle is “texture.”

“A lot of ingredients that you would traditionally put on a board are very flat,” she said. “So find beautiful ways to fold your meats or stack your ingredients.”

Her third principle is “color.” This means pulling in different pops of color throughout the board, which can be done through different colored fruits, vegetables, cheeses or jams.

The final principle is “theme,” which is important as we approach the holiday season. Theme can be taken many different ways, from using colors that represent a specific holiday, to placing ingredients into different patterns to take the shape of things like Halloween pumpkins or Christmas trees.

Above everything that Delaney has taught to her 45,000 Instagram followers, her main goal is to teach people that charcuterie making is more approachable than it used to be.

“Before this explosion of charcuterie boards, people had this idea that they were unapproachable,” said Delaney. “People thought it had to be really fancy cheeses and really fancy meats, but that’s totally not the case. You can build something really beautiful with ingredients from Aldi or Trader Joe’s.”

No matter what’s on the board or what ingredients are used, charcuterie has become a fun and exciting way to eat during a time when people needed fun and excitement in their lives. But how has such a shareable and social type of appetizer become so popular during a time when everyone had to stay 6 feet apart?

Picture it: a wide array of meats, cheeses, fruits, nuts, crackers and dips perfectly arranged on a large wooden board, surrounded by people touching and breathing all over it. Nothing screams “COVID” louder. But during lockdown, single serving charcuterie boards became the craze. Who wouldn’t want to graze on a personal board while binge-watching shows on Netflix?

Avalos, who started her business during lockdown, created her original menu with only single serving options due to the CDC’s social distancing guidelines. It wasn’t until the world started opening back up when she added the traditional, large board options to her menu.

“They were perfect for people to enjoy by themselves,” said Avalos.

Delany also said that during early COVID, she leaned towards posting content of individual or mini charcuterie boards, but she was surprised people were interested in charcuterie at all. Originally, Delaney, who created her charcuterie blog in 2018, thought that the growing love for charcuterie boards would die out when the pandemic hit, because people were no longer entertaining and gathering. The exact opposite happened.

“You would think people wouldn’t be interested in such a shared food,” said Delaney. “But it completely exploded.”

Now that COVID regulations have lifted and people are socializing again, charcuterie boards are becoming a staple at most large gatherings.

“We are social creatures, and community is very important,” said Avalos. “I think charcuterie is a really good way for people to come together, especially since people are now wanting to be together again.”

According to Berry, grazing a charcuterie board is also a really good way to try new things, since charcuterie is very much a finger-food and you can help yourself to anything.

“What makes a charcuterie board so great is that it’s giving people so many different options to try and pair things together that they normally wouldn’t think about,” said Berry. “If someone’s at home and they know they like cheddar cheese and salami, they’re just going to eat cheddar cheese and salami. When you have that on a board with so many other options, it gives them something new to try.”

Since charcuterie boards are broadening and including much more diverse ingredients, there is something for everyone to snack on, even those with dietary restrictions. Long ago, if someone vegan took a look at a charcuterie board, they would run in the opposite direction, as it’s everything that they can’t eat. Today, that’s not the case.

“We love catering to anybody with dietary restrictions. It’s fun to do, and there’s a lot of options out there,” said Avalos. “There’s a huge selection of vegan cheeses and even vegan deli meats today.”

Now-a-days, there’s really no excuse not to try a charcuterie board. Are you worried about social gatherings and sharing food? That’s fine! There are plenty of single serving options out there.

Do you have a dietary restriction? That’s fine! There are plenty of food replacements for you.

Do you just not like snacking on meats and cheeses, but you like the aesthetic of a charcuterie board? That’s fine! Today, charcuterie boards are much more than meats and cheeses.

Do you just not know how to make a board? That’s fine! There are plenty of tutorials and classes offered.

Or maybe you just don’t have the time to make one? That’s fine! There are plenty of charcuterie businesses that are more than happy to build you your dream board.

Avalos says this trend is here to stay, so you might as well explore your options.

Something that started out as a rather average french appetizer has evolved into something much greater, thanks to COVID. Charcuterie has become a creative outlet for foodies and people who just want to spice up their ways of eating. Building a board doesn’t have to be hard, or aesthetically pleasing at first, so gather your favorite snacks and get started.

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Photos curtesy of Meatcheeseboards and Chucktowncheeseboards on Instagram.