A relish tray is a cold platter of pickles, olives, crisp raw vegetables and a creamy dip, set out to be nibbled before and through a big dinner. It needs no cooking. It earns its spot beside rich holiday food because everything on it is crunchy, briny and chilled.
When friends come over for a holiday dinner, I set one out before anyone sits down. It’s the one dish that needs no oven time, and on a crowded stove that is the whole appeal!
The cold pickle-and-veggie platter is its own dish. If you want cured meats and a cheese lineup, that’s the Costco charcuterie board or the turkey charcuterie board. The cranberry orange relish is a spoonable condiment that shares the word but not the job. Hot starters live in the Thanksgiving appetizer ideas, and the rest of your table is in the Thanksgiving side dishes ranking.
What goes on a relish tray
Think in five slots, with one or two items in each. A tray holding every pickle in the store looks busy, while five clear jobs look planned.
- Sharp. One pickled thing: cornichons, dill spears, pickled beets or quick-pickled carrots. Epicurious builds its tray around a cup of cornichons and half a batch of quick pickled carrots.
- Salty. Olives. Epicurious uses a cup of pitted black olives, and pitted is the kind choice, since nobody wants to hunt for a second bowl to hold the pits.
- Crisp. Raw vegetables cut for dunking. Epicurious cuts celery into logs about 4 to 5 inches long and adds a bunch of radishes, halved if they’re large. EatingWell reaches for carrots, peppers, radishes and snap peas.
- Creamy. One dip. Ranch and tzatziki are easy picks, and EatingWell’s list includes a dill pickle dip that puts the leftover jar juice to work. One r/Pickles commenter votes for cream cheese topped with habanero jelly, scooped up with crackers.
- Sturdy. A wedge of sharp cheese and crackers that won’t fold under a dip. EatingWell pairs its tray with sharp cheese and whole-grain crackers.
Cooksinfo says that in the 1960s and 1970s, cut-glass relish dishes with compartments were popular Christmas gifts. The trays sat right on the table through dinner, loaded with gherkins, olives, pickled beets, chunks of cheese and radishes.
I’d copy that part of the tradition. A sharp pickle next to turkey and stuffing resets your mouth between bites, so leave the tray out for the whole meal, not just the first few minutes.
Relish tray, veggie tray, charcuterie board: what’s different
A charcuterie board spotlights cured meats. A relish tray, as EatingWell describes it, leans into crisp produce for a lighter spread: bright pickles, raw or blanched vegetables, a creamy dip, a few cheese wedges and whole-grain crackers.
A veggie tray sits closer. It’s raw vegetables and one dip, and the moment you add the briny pieces (pickles and olives) it becomes a relish tray. Cooksinfo uses relish platter for the compartment dish itself.
Why the carrot-and-celery tray gets ignored
Why did relish trays fall out of fashion? Cooksinfo has a theory. Hosts, told that people liked carrot and celery sticks, loaded the trays with them, and guests reached around the dried-out sticks to get to the cheese.
That’s the failure to avoid. Give every vegetable a reason to be there: pickled, salted or dunked. Quick-pickle the carrots so they taste like something, and bring celery and radishes back to a snap with a soak in ice water before they hit the platter!
“Ever since I was a kid, My favorite part of Thanksgiving is setting up and eating the Relish Tray”
– r/Pickles, November 2025 (692 upvotes)
A reply in the same thread said the relish tray was all they wanted, because they don’t like traditional Thanksgiving foods even a little bit. That’s a fair reason to keep a few plain, familiar things on the tray, so I put the olives and cheese within easy reach at the kids’ end of the table.
Arrange it so nothing goes soggy
Start with a big flat platter or board, then set small bowls on it for anything wet. Pickles, olives and the dip go in the bowls, so brine never creeps over to your crackers.
Pat the pickles dry before they go in. It’s the fiddly step, and it takes about a minute with a paper towel.
Then fill the space around the bowls with the vegetables in loose groups, one kind per pile, so your guests can see their choices at a glance. Crackers and cheese go to the edge farthest from the pickle bowls, and you can add them last.
You don’t need the compartment dish, either.
In an r/Fiestaware thread, a collector asked whether a compartment relish tray was worth $150. One reply said they wouldn’t pay that and noted the piece came with no bottom plate, and another said they walked away for the same reason. A rimmed platter plus three small bowls does the same job with dishes you already own.
What to make ahead, and what waits
EatingWell says everything on a relish tray can be prepped quickly or ahead, then arranged just before guests arrive. That’s the best reason to make one in the same weekend you’re juggling a turkey.
Start with the quick pickles, since they improve with time. EatingWell says its pickled beets need only about 30 minutes in the brine, and a longer marinade just deepens the flavor. Stir up the dip the day before too.
I cut the celery and radishes the night before a big dinner and stand them in a container of cold water in the fridge, which keeps them snappy.
The morning of, fill the small bowls and keep them cold along with the empty platter. Cheese and crackers wait until the last few minutes, because crackers go limp first!
Leftovers are easy. Jars of pickles and olives go back in the fridge as they are, and cut vegetables make tomorrow’s lunch. If a dip sat on the table through dinner, it’s finished, so serve it from a small bowl and refill from the fridge. You’ll thank yourself at cleanup!
Quick answers before you shop
What is another name for a relish tray?
Relish platter is the alternate name cooksinfo uses for the cut-glass compartment dishes that held the tray. The nearest cousin is a veggie tray or crudités platter, minus the pickles and olives.
Where can I buy a relish tray?
You can buy the ingredients at any grocery store, and cooksinfo points out that the spreads come ready-made in the deli section while the chopping takes about five minutes. The dish is a secondhand find: one r/uraniumglass poster reported a green glass relish tray at a thrift store for $2.99.
What goes in a good veggie tray?
Pick sturdy vegetables that hold a dip: carrots, peppers, radishes and snap peas are EatingWell’s picks for dunking, and you can add celery and cucumber slices the same way. Put the tray out last, right before the first guest sits, so the vegetables are still cold at the first dunk.