End Grain Cutting Board Finish Recommendations


Jonathan McCully

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Finishing up some end grain boards made with hard maple, walnut, and cherry for Christmas gifts.  There are a million different food safe finishes on the market so was just looking for recommendations from the community.  Would like something that I can buy a small bottle of, for not too much money, to give along with the board so that it can be periodically refreshed.  Let me know what you guys think.  Thanks!

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I use this for my flat sawn cutting baords should work on endgrain as well. If you have a woodcraft near by you can buy it in a 2 oz variety. I sugest doing the initial coating yourself with a larger bottle. I heat my boards in the oven on 150 for no more than 5 min and apply a couple coats to get it really soaked in there.

https://www.woodcraft.com/products/howard-butcher-block-conditioner-2-fl-oz

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5 minutes ago, ..Kev said:

I use General Finishes Salad Bowl finish.  I'm sure they come in smaller cans.

+1

Also mineral oil is inexpensive and you could finds some small reusable bottle and a funnel and fill them yourself to give out. 

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Mineral oil and beeswax.  As stated above, MO can be bought in the pharmacy, and I bought a 1 lb block of beeswax in a local honey store. This way I can make my own and portion it into smaller containers as required.  

There are lots of "recipes" online to get an idea of the proportions of oil to wax.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 10/31/2018 at 2:25 PM, Chestnut said:

I use this for my flat sawn cutting baords should work on endgrain as well. If you have a woodcraft near by you can buy it in a 2 oz variety. I sugest doing the initial coating yourself with a larger bottle. I heat my boards in the oven on 150 for no more than 5 min and apply a couple coats to get it really soaked in there.

https://www.woodcraft.com/products/howard-butcher-block-conditioner-2-fl-oz

They have it at Menards as well.

https://www.menards.com/main/paint/interior-paint-stain/wood-conditioners-oils/howard-butcher-block-conditioner-12-oz/bbwaxbbc012/p-1444433595089-c-13129.htm?tid=7245082855961612073&ipos=6

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Hey Damon ,

17 hours ago, Damon777 said:

You guys who use MO and beeswax, would this also apply to spoons and rolling pins, etc?

I am also a beekeeper, and have a bit of wax around typically.

are you a hobby beekeeper or commercial ? I was wondering if colony collapse was less of a concern to the hives that don't get shipped or hauled around from place to place ?

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1 hour ago, wdwerker said:

Hey Damon ,

are you a hobby beekeeper or commercial ? I was wondering if colony collapse was less of a concern to the hives that don't get shipped or hauled around from place to place ?

 

I am a hobbyist. I did not have any this summer, as I lost both of my swarms over last winter. Winter is rough around here, and I am about 50% on if I can get the bees through. I did take a couple of short courses at the UofM on cold climate beekeeping, so I am not going in "blind". (My grandfather and father also had bees for a while, but I wasn't interested when they were doing it.) I have not had any colonies collapse during the summer that I cannot attribute to mites, or losing a queen without sufficient brood/workers to make a new one. Winter losses were either mites or not enough honey to keep them alive all winter. I do post-mortem in the spring when I go out to open the hives up for the year.

As far as moving around, when I purchase packages, they come from Mississippi or California. I lean more toward what is used for pesticides in commercial crops causing it around here. In my first beekeeping class, there was a bit of a push against neonicotinoids in crops by one of the professors. A couple of years later when I took the second year class, she said that the attitude had changed regarding these in this area. She suggested not advocating for the ban of these pesticides in non-ornamental plants, as we know how to deal with them from a beekeeping perspective, and who knows what they will come up with next if neonics are outlawed. If you have netflix, I believe this is still on there: https://www.vanishingbees.com/ It's older, and maybe a bit "eclectic", but I feel that it presents a good theory on what is going on with colony collapse. Fortunately for me, I live in an area with sufficient flowering plants that aren't crops so I don't really worry about it. The neighbor's apple trees have gone ballistic since we moved in, though. Our yard is about 5% white clover, and I am fine with that. I also don't kill dandelions in the spring, as those (along with maple trees) are one of the first honeybee food sources of the spring. Sorry for all of the beekeeping stuff on a woodworking forum...

 

10 hours ago, Dennis O'Shea said:

Yes it's food safe finish 

This I knew. I was more asking about durability vs. just salad bowl oil and the like.

 

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  • 1 month later...

I've got a newbie question -

While finishing a batch of end-grain boards, I mixed a 2-1 Mineral-Spirits to the Behlen salad bowl finish B603-00015;

On the second coat (+12hrs), after 4 days away, I see white splotches (below), and they do not simply wipe or 0000-steel pad away (on all 5 boards !, only one shown below)

Anyone with similar experience ?

What did I do wrong ? (the Beylens was purchased just days ago)

IMG_0428.JPG

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