How to Build: Charcuterie Chalet

There is a new form of edible architecture that has a lot of people talking, so we wanted to know: what is a Charcuterie Chalet and can I eat one? You have probably heard of the holiday tradition of building gingerbread houses. Candy cane columns, gumdrop pathways, and walls of gingerbread and frosting.

But some genius out there saw the gingerbread house trend and said: “why not a savory, holiday-themed edible house?” At that moment the Charcuterie Chalet was born! Instead of using cookies, frosting, chocolate kisses, and other candies and sweets, a Charcuterie Chalet is made of cured meats, mustard, and other salty and savory accouterments.

A chalet (pronounced: shall-AY) is a wooden house or cottage, typically associated with the Swiss Alps. Imagine a small, cozy ski lodge with a crackling fireplace inside. Now imagine it’s made out of ham, salami, mustard, and pickles! Anything edible that you would normally find on a charcuterie board is fair game: crackers, pretzels, honey, nuts, pickled vegetables, and of course cured meats.

The trend of building Charcuterie Chalets for the holiday season seems new, and we are here for it. As long as your chalet is built entirely of food items and kept at food-safe temperatures while stored, there’s no reason not to eat it when you’re done! Chef Samantha Buyskes of Simply Red Events and Culinary Adventures put together a great recipe and instructional video so you can make (and eat!) your very own Charcuterie Chalet at home!

Written and filmed by Chef  Samantha Buyskes of Simply Red Events and Culinary Adventures, FLX, NY

Ingredients you’ll need for the Charcuterie Chalet:

• Niman Ranch Charcuterie: one package each uncured pepperoni, uncured hot sopressata, uncured genoa salame, uncured summer sausage, uncured summer sausage with garlic, uncured prosciutto, uncured cappicola
• 4 8oz packages of cream cheese
• 1 bag each of pretzel logs, pretzel sticks and pretzel squares
• 1 box ryvita rye crackers
• 2 whole olives
• 1 jar favorite mustard
• 1 jar cornichon pickles
• 1 sprig of thyme
• several small red flowers
• sliced black olives
• red currants or goji berries
• 1 jar favorite jam
• 1 large sheet tray 13 by 18, cutting board, couple skewers 4.5 inches long
• farmer and a few farm animal figurines 

Steps: 

1. Spread 2 8oz packages of cream cheese on to the base of the sheet tray. The tray is flipped over before the cream cheese is added.
2. Count out 22 pretzels logs. Try to find the straightest ones.
3. Open summer sausage and trim the rounded ends off and save them to use for bricks along the walkway and the base of the two trees. Cut the log three times to make 4 long pieces then cut each part twice to make a total of 12 pieces from each log of summer sausage.
4. Cut the Salami and pepperoni circles into quarters.
5. Spread 6 Ryvita rye crackers with a nice layer of cream cheese, layer folded over quarters of the salami and pepperoni onto 4 of the crackers. As per the video. On the last two crackers layer the prosciutto 2 pieces on each cracker.
6. Now we can start building the Chalet. For this, you will need the sheet tray with the cream cheese, 16 pretzel logs and 16 pieces of summer sausage. Along with one of the 8oz blocks of cream cheese divided between three pastry bags. Follow the video on how to assemble alternating pretzels and sausage logs supporting them with the cream cheese.
7. Take the piece of thyme and wrap in over itself into a circle, push through some little red flowers, place some cream cheese on the back of the wreath and attach to ryvite cracker to make a front door. Place 6 dollops of cream cheese on back of the cracker and attach to the front to make the door.
8. Take the two pieces of smaller 1/2 ryvita crackers and place into a layer of cream cheese above door frame and in the same place on the back of the house to support the roof. Place another layer of cream cheese on the top of the cracker. Take 4 pretzel sticks and place into dollops of cream cheese.
9. Place three big pretzel logs on top of the two crackers from end to end to create support for the crackers and the roof.
10. Each ryvita cracker that has the meat on it will be placed on either side with a cream cheese layer between them to help them stick together. A nice thick layer. Use the capicola to make windows where there are gaps. See video.
11. Now add decorations: Pave the way from the front door to the end of the tray using the summer sausage triangle pieces and fill in with mustard. Then the pretzel well filled with jam. Then add windows with the pretzel squares. Black olive slices stuffed with red currants with a tad of cream cheese on the back and place along the front as light decorations. Finally, finish the top of the roof and place the last 3 pretzel logs
12. Now chill the charcuterie chalet and enjoy.