How to Make the Ultimate Crudité Platter {Vegan}

A great selection of prepared crudités makes a healthy and stunning centerpiece for a party or buffet table.  Mix and match according to the seasons and your taste.  Here is everything you need to know to make a vegan platter your guests will love to eat!

Crudités – an easy healthy addition for your party table

I love party food and dips, but it is all too easy to forget to add some healthier offerings.  A platter of fresh vegetables can be a welcome addition to the table, providing freshness, crunch and texture, as well as something for a selection of dips.

It is very easy to chop up some carrot and pepper batons of an evening, but they can be a little uninspiring, a huge platter of vegetables is a feast for the taste buds as well as the eyes, and wil be something they will enjoy eating.

 Tips and tricks for preparing the Ultimate Crudité Platter

• The vegetables have to be at their peak of freshness.
• Variety is key.  Think about the colour, texture and taste – with a full range of sweet such a baby corn, or baby carrots, to a hint of bitterness such as tenderstem broccoli.  Aim for 10 or more different vegetables.
• Arrange the vegetables with care: a plate overflowing with fresh, vibrant vegetable looks so enticing, Don’t just pile them up. A platter should be a feast for the eyes.
• Blanch some of the green, leafy items. Plunge them into ice cold water, and the colours will really pop.
• Cut the vegetables to bite sized pieces (or two at most). At a party, with a drink in hand, nobody wants to be trying to munch their way through an overly large carrot or huge broccoli floret. With all that chopping you will need a good, sharp knife, and chopping board.
• Prepare a few hours ahead and store the vegetables in air tight containers in the fridge, with a piece a damp kitchen paper to preserve freshness.

What can I include on the Ultimate Crudité Platter?

Use your imagination!  Here are some ideas to get you started!

• Asparagus – I use trimmed baby spears – serve them raw
• Baby Corn – trim and cut lengthwise
• Bell Peppers – use mini peppers if you get them, and cut into strips lengthwise.  Discard the inner membranes and seeds
• Broccoli or tenderstem – cut into florets, peel and cut the stalks into battens.
• Beet – choose baby beetroot, scrub or peel and cut into thin wedges – candy beetroot with their pink and white rings and sweet flavour is ideal
• Carrots – peel and cut into battens, baby heirloom carrots are perfect
• Cauliflower – cut the florets into bite sized pieces
• Celery – wash, remove the string and cut into battens
• Cucumber – remove the seeds and cut into sticks, or use baby cucumbers
• Fennel – slice thinly – if you want to put in a sieve and pour a kettle of boiling water over to tone down the flavour
• Green Beans – topped and tailed, cut if needed
• Mushrooms – washed, patted try, trimmed and sliced
• Radishes – quarter – again heirloom varieties are better, with their different colours.
• Sugarsnap peas – top and tail, cut lengthwise if needed
• Cherry or baby plum tomatoes – halve or quarter

How to Assemble the Ultimate Crudité Platter

Start by selecting your vegetables and preparing them, think about the colours and how you will arrange them on the platter so they will look balanced and the colours will be evenly spread out.

Cover your platter with vibrant leaves, such as radicchio or a purple lettuce, add a dish of olives and one of baby gherkins.

Slowly build up the vegetables

Adding them to platter, one by one…

… until you are done and ready to serve.

THE EGG Knife Block, with Cuisinepro Knives

When it comes to knife skills, I’m no Zorro or Inigo Montoya, but even I’m very aware that a spell at the chopping board results in much better results if I use a good quality, sharp knife.

I prepared these crudites using knives from Cuisinepro stored in THE EGG knife block available exclusively from HOUSE.

THE EGG is a stylish accessory for modern kitchens: a 38cm high by 19.5cm in diameter egg shaped holder. Take the top off with a flourish, in the manner of a waiter lifting the dome off a plate of food, and reveal the 6 Cuisinepro knives stored beneath.  To preserve the shine and keep it free of fingerprints, there’s a retractable knob on the top.

THE EGG looks like a modern piece of sculpture, and looks fantastic out on the worktop and right at home on our granite next to the hob.  I think it would look amazing in loft style apartments, open plan or industrial style kitchens.

The set comes with a 9cm paring knife, a 12cm utility knife. 12.5cm and 15cm Japanese Santoku knives, a 20cm chef knife and a 20cm bread knife – a full range for all kitchen tasks, from small and fiddly to big, beefy tasks like chopping pumpkin and squashes.

Good knives are so important – they make kitchen prep so much easier and are slightly paradoxically far safer than blunt knives as they are less likely to slip and cut you.

I prefer a smaller knife, so was pleased to see 3 smaller ones in this set, the paring and utility knives were ideal for the fiddly and precise chopping needed for preparing the vegetables for the platter, making the job quick and easy.

Ed used the larger knives easily cut through large tougher, denser, vegetables such as squash and swede, and the utility knives slide through notoriously solid turnips.

We bake very crusty sourdough (a tough test for any bread knife), which the Cuisinepro knife slide through, cutting thin regular slices with barely any effort.

THE EGG knife block by Cuisinepro is for sale exclusively from HOUSE, both online and at their stores. It’s recommended retail price is £750, but it is available online at £399.99 by using the checkout code EGGVIPOFFER. The knife set used with THE EGG are made from superior Japanese steel, double sharpened and Rockwell tested to 53 HRC for superior performance and long life. Cuisinepro is a premium brand that offers a full range of kitchen equipment.

HOUSE originated in Australia, but launched in the UK in April, and now have six stores around the country, with a new store to open in Stratford Westfield this month, well as an online shop. It’s part of the largest speciality retail kitchen and homewares chain in the Southern Hemisphere; the move into the UK is the chain’s first foray north of the equator.

Recipe for the Ultimate Crudite Platter Sponsored by House UK.  We also received an THE EGG for review.  All opinions our own.