Exotic Woods as cutting boards?


tim0625

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I've used purple heart, yellow heart, walnut and lots of other woods. No one has ever become ill. Nor have I ever heard of anyone becoming ill from any cutting board regardless of what it's made from. Some people may react to wood dust when cutting it, but in a cutting board that cannot happen unless you're sawing it in half.

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I've used purple heart, yellow heart, walnut and lots of other woods. No one has ever become ill. Nor have I ever heard of anyone becoming ill from any cutting board regardless of what it's made from. Some people may react to wood dust when cutting it, but in a cutting board that cannot happen unless you're sawing it in half.

agreed,. unless you end up eating the cutting board, there is no danger (unless you are personally allergic to a species, it can happen) especially end grain, where you almost can'T cut into the wood at all. As for open pores wood, they'd have to be sealed. What i normally do is i use some poly based salad bowl finish, dilute it a little, apply a generous 1st coat and when it's still wet, sand the cutting board with a 320/400 wet/dry sand paper untill its kinda like a pasty brownish mixture. let it dry 5 mins and wipe off the excess, let dry, then switch to mineral oil. the 1st varnish coat wont stay on the surface much but it will seal everything nicely with that dust you created while sanding, and will help your mineral oil stay on the surface for better protection. i did it with read oak and it sealed well. if i didn't do this, water went straight through the board !

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I just started my "cutting board season" today. Here is some hard maple, bloodwood, cherry, walnut, yellowheart and purpleheart I cut into strips. I'll get 4 nice endgrain boards out of this. I also have some Koa, sapele, padauk, and zebrawood to mix in the next batch. I use Maple and cherry in just about every board. I will say the exotics are rough on tools - especially the bloodwood.

cuttingboards.jpg

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Hmm, I see cutting boards in shops all the time made with all kinds of exotics but I won't use them myself. I use mostly maple, oak and lyptus with a little walnut for accent. Mid bost update. Using the following link, I may have to adjust my position. Seems many of the woods are not any more toxic than maple.

http://www.wood-database.com/wood-articles/wood-allergies-and-toxicity/

BRuce

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For what it's worth, bloodwood and yellowheart are very irritating for me to work with. I actually wear a full face respirator because if I don't, my eyes get really puffy and almost swollen shut when I wake up the next day. I still don't avoid them for cutting boards and I have 2 personal ones with both species. As mentioned above, unless you are eating it (and a lot of it), there isn't much harm. I do avoid open grained woods like oak and ash though. They can harbor bacteria a bit deeper than other woods. That is also sort of a myth and plenty of people have proven otherwise, but I still don't want to take chances when maple and cherry are around the same price for me anyway.

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Good link Bruce....thanks...it seems that most woods on this chart have some measure of irritant factor with some going into the category of toxicity. I doubt anything going into our lungs besides a little general dust and good ol' air is not good. When you compound that with a heavier grade of dust - sawdust, throw in some irritant qualities and some allergies to certain woods like Joelav described, it gets a little dicey. I've referenced

from YouTube a few times. In part 1 or either part 2, he talks about wood working shops in CA closing because the owner developed lung problems due to exotic species and poor dust collection. Maybe it's kind of like medicines....if you inhale something, the effect is more immediate and potent as opposed to ingesting it. If you cut chicken on a Padauk cutting board, there may be some measure of toxicity that transfers but maybe it's so small, it's no more harmful than the bacteria that developed on it in the store. (?)
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According to America's test kitchen (a PBS show) the #1 rated cutting board in their testing was edge grain teak. Both both natural and synthetic boards were tested. After reading that I made a large one as I have a lot of scrap teak laying around. Love it. Here a Link to the test video It's about 10 min. Worth watching.

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  • 2 years later...

Here is a proposal and some questions for you:

 

My wife is a biochemistry professor and in the summer will runs short term research projects with undergraduate students.  Its basically a way to introduce science students into the methods of scientific research and working in a science lab.  I was reading some of the research summary to her and she is now interested in possibly doing a summer project on researching cutting boards and contamination.

 

We have some ideas of research parameters/questions that she could test out, but I wanted to throw it out to the woodworking community to see if you all have any parameters we haven't thought of.  Here is what we've already discussed:

1.  Grain type:  face grain vs straight grain vs end grain

2.  Finish type:  unfinished, oil, salad bowl, wipe on poly, shellac, etc.  (other suggestions very welcome, including variations on how to apply finish if relevant)

3.  Different wood species (this is the big big one for me, have the potential to scientifically determine what species we should and shouldn't be using from a bacterial contamination standpoint).

4.  Effect of natural antibiotics:  potentially adding oils of naturally antibiotic plants to the finish?

5.  Bactericidal vs bacteria-static:  "Anit-bacterial" includes both of these.  does the wood kill bacteria or just prevent them from multiplying?  Is there a difference between different species of wood.  Can you make the wood bactericidal with a treatment before, during or after finishing that makes the wood a bacterial killer?

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I'd like to throw in a couple different types of plastic cutting boards for comparison.  Make sure to put some knife cuts into the boards before testing, or test with and without knife cuts.

 

I've heard that plastic is better: artificial "sterile" material, no pores or cracks, can be washed aggressively (ie, dishwasher, or scrubbing hard with hot water and soap).

 

I've heard that wood is better: doesn't get knife mark "furrows" like plastic, naturally, anti-biotic.

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Call me crazy (you're crazy!), but bacteria vs. cutting boards is a common theme, and does it all feel like a lot of to-do about nothing?

 

When's the last time you heard of anyone getting really sick, and cutting boards being the culprit.  Cheap wooden long grain, and cheap plastic boards have been sold and used for years. 

 

Common sense generally has, and continues to prevail when it comes to cross-contamination and cutting boards.  (i.e., don't use the same board you just used to cut raw chicken to then cut up veggies to immediately snack on). 

 

Give the cutting board a quickie with soap and water, dry, throw it in the drawer.  Wash your hands when exiting the little boys/girls room.   Keep your cutting boards away from the MRSA clinic.

 

Also, once dry, the board is generally no longer a very hospitable place for bacteria to live.  Now that damp sponge you're using to clean the cutting board...that's a different story. 

 

With the exception of treated lumber, I'd venture to say that our bodies are well equipped to handle whatever wood our food was prepped on, as long as common sense is used in the kitchen.

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+1 for common sense and sanitation!

But there are an increasing number of people with sensitivity to certain substances, peanut and walnut oils come to mind first. I also wouldn't use open grained woods like oak or ash in a cutting board, yet you see it used fairly regularly by hobbiests .

A little research and some caution would be wise.

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Vinny,

Your post made me smile.  I think back and all mom had for a cutting board was a piece of 1/2 plywood about 6" x 9".  She cut EVERYTHING on that board.  While she's cooking she always had a sink of dish water made up to wash as she cooked and dirtied something.... she'd cut the chicken, wash the board off and cut something else.  It was all beaten up with splits and cracks....she would just wash it off and keep going.  We were never sick.  I guess though if someone has greater sensitivities to things, they'd have to be more careful.

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Vinny,

Your post made me smile. I think back and all mom had for a cutting board was a piece of 1/2 plywood about 6" x 9". She cut EVERYTHING on that board. While she's cooking she always had a sink of dish water made up to wash as she cooked and dirtied something.... she'd cut the chicken, wash the board off and cut something else. It was all beaten up with splits and cracks....she would just wash it off and keep going. We were never sick. I guess though if someone has greater sensitivities to things, they'd have to be more careful.

why is it that we were never getting sick from food then like we do today? Were we tougher back then or just uninformed???
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why is it that we were never getting sick from food then like we do today? Were we tougher back then or just uninformed???

 

Back then food was food.  I tell my daughter the ingredients in some of the things on the grocer's shelf and if she cant pronounce them back to me,  it's not good to eat (simple litmus test) :-)  She's 4...  Good rule of thumb ;)

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