This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #PickyAboutProduce #CollectiveBias

Have I ever told you all how much I love grocery shopping? Of course I have. Remember? I shared tips for effortless grocery shopping not too long ago. Don’t make fun of me but I sometimes use trips to the grocery store as “me time”. You know – time when I can think to myself a little, mark off items on my grocery list and most importantly, peruse the produce section (my favorite).

I especially love perusing the produce section at Food City. And yes, you can have a favorite produce section at a grocery store – that’s totally normal. The produce at Food City is bright and colorful and certainly gets me really excited to fill up my basket to make something yummy at home. The other reason why I love it so much is because Food City and I have something in common: we’re both picky about our produce.

For someone like me, who cooks A LOT, that’s huge. When I’m pressed for time, it’s so comforting to know that Food City takes so much pride in sourcing their fruits and vegetables, so I don’t have to – YES!

Charcuterie with Food City fruits & veggies

So here’s the thing: because Food City made my life so easy in finding fresh, ready-to-use produce, I decided to put together a charcuterie board (they make awesome snacks). Charcuterie boards are all the rage – do people still say that? I order them during happy hour and I’ve made them for parties at home. I can’t say this enough: if you’re entertaining at home, charcuterie boards are a wonderful way to feature a variety of items. You can have salty, sweet, savory items mixed with crunchy foods – the sky is really the limit when creating a charcuterie board.

For today’s board, Food City’s ShortCuts Meal Solutions helped me save time picking out ingredients and designing my board. That’s exactly what their ShortCuts product line is designed to do: save time. ShortCuts Meal Solutions feature everything from grab-and-go fruits to steam-in-bag veggies. They’re pre-washed, pre-cut, convenient and ready to cook. I cannot express enough how much of a time-saver this is.

After you head to Food City to gather your items, head home and grab a platter or a cutting board and get creative! Here are my biggest tips for creating your own charcuterie board:

Start with larger items. If you’re using big blocks of cheese or ramekins, set those out first.

Build around those larger items. Use items like grapes, crackers, vegetables, etc. to fill in the the gaps.

Don’t overthink it. Charcuterie boards provide a plethora of flavors, textures and colors – make it fun!

My charcuterie snack board was beautiful (and delicious) thanks to the passion Food City takes in providing shoppers with high quality produce.

So what’s on my charcuterie board?

I wanted to create a robust and flavorful board using quality ingredients from Food City. My board included:

• apples
• almond butter
• ShortCuts steam-in-bag broccoli (tossed in olive oil, seasoned with salt & pepper)
• peaches
• pretzels (something salty)
• ShortCuts cantaloupe wrapped in prosciutto (and drizzled with olive oil and sea salt)
• cheese
• broiled grapefruit (sprinkled with brown sugar then broiled)
• lime slices
• cherries

Note: you can also use some of the juice of the lime to squeeze over some of the other fruits to keep them from turning brown too quickly.

Enough of my rambling. Grab your wallet and head to your closest Food City to stock up on your own basket full of fresh produce.