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What You Need To Know About Cutting Boards

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Purchasing Your Cutting Board  

 

Buy the best board you can afford, take care of it, and it is likely that your grandchildren will be using it. Even as they age, or especially as they age, good wooden cutting boards become more and more attractive.

Your first consideration should be how much counter space you have. The bigger the board, the less you will find yourself fussing. The second question is which mix of wood is best for you. Your main choices at BW Woodworks are Hard Maple with Purple Heart or with Walnut or all three. And be sure that if you buy a cutting board that's thick, its surface doesn't sit so high on your countertop that you can't cut on it comfortably. A good-size cutting board weighs a good deal. You are likely to leave it where it sits. So buy a cutting board that fits your counter space and looks pleasing.

Before using a new cutting board, season it to prevent staining and absorption of food odors and bacteria. Before applying oil to cutting board, warm the oil slightly. Apply oil with a soft cloth, in the direction of the grain, allowing the oil to soak in between each of the four or five coats required for the initial seasoning. After each treatment, wait about four to six hours and wipe off oil that did not soak into the wood (oxidation or hardening of the oil will take approximately 6 hours). Re-oil the cutting board monthly or as often as needed.  

 

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Types of Boards           

 Cutting Boards 15”x12”x1½”

The best to be found and will meet the needs of the most discerning customer. More durable than regular cutting boards, these boards look beautiful on your countertop.  A ¼” groove is routed around the board 1½” from the edge. The underside has four rubber feet to ensure stability. These boards come in many different laminated patterns with many unique mixes of hard woods. With proper care this durable board will stay Beautiful for many years to come. 

Bread Boards 15”x12”x ¾”   

These are more versatile because of there lighter weight. I find it gratifying to here the different uses customers have used these boards. From a decorative piece to a serving tray to a good light cutting board as well.  The underside has four rubber feet to ensure stability and come in different mixes of hard woods.

Cheese Boards 8”x6”x ¾” and 8”x6”x1½”

These are pleasing to the eye and you will find very functional. Great for serving your favorite treats at parties.  A perfect gift for those hard to please ( you know).  The underside has four rubber feet to ensure stability and come in different mixes of hard woods.

Custom Boards Any Size

If you have browsed some of the different pictures on this site, you have seen some boards that don't quite match the descriptions above. Quite often customers ask for something unique that will fit their specific needs. We are always up for the challenge. At BW Woodworks occasionally you may find us doodling around looking for something extra unique as well.

 

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Maintaining And Cleaning Your Board   

 

Caution must be taken when using any type of cutting board. Here are some safety tips to keep in mind:

Some professional cooks like to add a little beeswax to the mineral oil for a tougher finish. Simply shave about 1/2 teaspoon beeswax into a microwave safe dish with a cupful of mineral oil; microwave on high for about 45 seconds. Apply to the cutting board while still warm. Save of dispose of the remainder of the oil. 

 

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Wood vs. Plastic Cutting Boards  

Did you know that wood cutting boards are the safest to use? For some reason, bacteria have a tougher time surviving on wood boards. Most people are surprised to hear that a wood cutting board may be more resistant to bacterial buildup than plastic ones. There is some debate on this topic, however, and I can make no claim one way of the other. I can tell you about my favorite wood cutting board! 

Supporting Documentation

For decades now, cooks in homes and restaurants have been urged to use plastic rather than wood cutting boards in the name of food safety. The fear is that disease-causing bacteria will soak into a cutting board and later contaminate other foods cut on the same surface and served uncooked, such as salad ingredients.

It's become an article of faith among "experts" that plastic cutting boards are safer for food preparation because, as the thinking goes, plastic is less hospitable to bacteria. It seems reasonable, but it ain't so, according to scientists at the UW-Madison's Food Research Institute.

Dean O. Cliver and Nese O. Ak, food microbiologists, have found that in some as yet unknown way wooden cutting boards kill bacteria that survive well on plastic boards. "This flies in the face of the prevailing wisdom," says Cliver. "It isn't what I expected. Our original objectives were to learn about bacterial contamination of wood cutting boards and to find a way to decontaminate the wood so it would be almost as safe as plastic. That's not what happened."

Cliver is quick to point out that cooks should continue to be careful when they handle foods and wash off cutting surfaces after they cut meat or chicken that may be contaminated with bacteria. "Wood may be preferable in that small lapses in sanitary practices are not as dangerous on wood as on plastic," he says. "This doesn't mean you can be sloppy about safety. It means you can use a wood cutting board if that is the kind you prefer. It certainly isn't less safe than plastic and appears to be more safe."

Cliver and Ak began by purposely contaminating wood and plastic boards with bacteria and then trying to recover those bacteria alive from the boards. They tested boards made from seven different species of trees and four types of plastic. They incubated contaminated boards overnight at refrigerator and room temperatures and at high and typical humidity levels. They tested several bacteria - Salmonella, Listeria and enterohemorrhagic Escherichia cold - known to produce food poisoning. The results consistently favored the wooden boards, often by a large margin over plastic boards, according to Cliver.

The scientists found that three minutes after contaminating a board that 99.9 percent of the bacteria on wooden boards had died, while none of the bacteria died on plastic. Bacterial numbers actually increased on plastic cutting boards held overnight at room temperature, but the scientists could not recover any bacteria from wooden boards treated the same way. Cliver hopes to continue the studies. A major question now, he says, is why wood is so inhospitable to bacteria. He and Ak have tried unsuccessfully to recover a compound in wood that inhibits bacteria.

So where did we get the idea that wood isn't safe? Cliver and Ak don't know. They did a literature search and have not found any studies that evaluated the food safety attributes of wood and plastic cutting boards.

 

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