Build Your Own Yogurt Parfait Bar Party Ideas + Free Printable!

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When we dedicated our younger daughter at church recently, I threw a huge party for her complete with a yogurt parfait party bar. It was a perfect brunch snack bar, since the timing of the party fell right between breakfast and lunch.

Overall, this food bar was a great success, and the guests loved it. I’m going to share with you why I love this yogurt bar idea and what ingredients I used to entice guests to create awesome yogurt parfaits.

What’s so easy about yogurt bars?

First of all, church starts at 9 am, and we wanted guests to come immediately to our house after the dedication. Since I didn’t want to wake up before the crack of dawn to start preparing food, I needed something that could be made the night before. That way I could simply take the food out and not make our guests wait forever to eat while I prepared something!

A yogurt parfait bar was the perfect food solution. Pretty much everything can be prepared the night before and refrigerated until needed. I did slice the banana the morning of, but otherwise, I had nothing to do but pull things out of the fridge.

Whenever I do party bars, I also love to have lots of options for guests to choose from. The different colors always add to the presentation, and I don’t have to worry about people’s tastes as much. That’s another reason party bars are so easy: everyone can find something they like, and dietary restrictions aren’t as big of a deal.

Compared to some party bars like chili bars, burger bars, etc, a yogurt bar is also significantly cheaper. It can be used as a snack bar, breakfast bar, or even brunch party bar, as was the case here.

Yogurt Parfait Topping Ideas

There are so many different options that you can choose from to have for your yogurt parfait party bar. I focused on some healthy options as well as a few sweeter, tastier options.

First, I started this bar with simple vanilla Greek yogurt in a bowl. I knew all our guests like Greek yogurt, which is what I put out for everyone as a base. I planned about 8 oz of yogurt for every person. With that calculation, I knew roughly how much yogurt to have out in the bowl. I did have an extra big container of vanilla regular yogurt in the fridge just in case we ran out.

Here are the other items I had displayed for people to choose from as they made their own yogurt parfaits.

Fruit: blackberries, blueberries, strawberries, and bananas. (You could also add raspberries, but there were no good looking ones when I went to the store that week!) And, because it was a baby dedication, I speared the blackberries to look like a cross. As a note, I did cut the banana right before serving guests. I didn’t want it sitting in the fridge and browning overnight.

Nuts: chopped pecans, sliced almonds, and walnuts. I wasn’t sure what I thought about peanuts, but you may find that to be a good option. The sliced almonds surprisingly went the fastest out of all the nut choices.

Coconut: this was also a favorite, which was a bit unexpected.
Raisins and dried cranberries: more people ate the raisins than the cranberries.
Chocolate chips: these were gone by the end of the party!
Granola and crushed Oreos: channeling Chick-fil-a and McDonald’s, I had to give these options for yogurt parfait toppings!

Serving The Yogurt Parfait Bar

I decided against pre-spooning yogurt into small bowls, because that would have taken a lot more fridge space the night before. Instead, I allowed guests to choose how much yogurt they wanted and spoon it themselves.

Every section of toppings had two spoons, which helped move the line along. I only put a small amount of each topping out on our island; I refilled whenever it was getting low.

Free Yogurt Party Bar Printable

As with all good parties, in my opinion, a fun sign really makes things look deluxe! Using a watercolor floral image I got from Pixabay, I made a yogurt bar sign. I put it in a document frame and set it out by the yogurt bar. Unfortunately, the glass of the frame made getting a good picture almost impossible due to glare, so this is the best I could manage!

Want to reuse my yogurt bar sign? Get your yogurt bar free printable sign here! This printable is in .pdf format and should automatically be set to print on an 8.5″x11″ sheet of paper. If you download this free printable yogurt bar sign, please use it for personal, not commercial, use only. Thanks!

And that’s it for this yogurt parfait bar! It was an easy food bar to prepare the night before, and it was a perfect late breakfast, early lunch meal.

Like party bars? Here are some others we’ve done in the past:

fruit cross with skewers Yogurt Bar Free Watercolor Printable! Yogurt Parfait Party Bar Ideas for toppings