How to make a cutting board

[Martin H. Eastburn]

Best to finish in Mineral oil. Buy it at the pharmacy. Vege might depending on the brand go rancid or otherwise bad.

Mart> >

[Martin H. Eastburn]

Grand father-in-law - was a butcher in his later life. He always cleaned his block table Ammonia. He also poured it on his cuts and had several finger tips slightly askew - being affixed again with Ammonia killing germs.

Mart> >> Wooden boards need to be looked after with more care and make sure you

[notbob]

I disagree. I know more about cooking than woodworking. Yes, traditionally, butcher blocks are treated with Mineral oil. Do you want to use a "petroleum" product around your food? I don't.

I never used any oil on my 10"X10" cutting board for 12 yrs! Yes, it finally split and I discarded it. Hey!! That's 12 yrs. I think I can afford it. You wanna invest in a 3'x3'x3' butcher block, ok. Use some mineral oil, if you want. I'm not putting Shell oil in my bod. Jes my opinion. ;)

nb

[Ed Pawlowski]

Pharmaceutical grade, it is even used as a laxative. Perfectly safe.

[notbob]

As a person who suffered surgery grade hemorroids at the age of 22, I'll debate "Perfectly safe" all day long. There are definite downsides to ingesting any "laxitive", but especially a ....again I say!.... PETROLEUM-based one.

I would be more than willing to talk about and give advice on a subject that was the bane of my life for almost ten years. I've not suffered 'em since and can speak with some authority on how and why they are no longer an issue. I would be more than happy to help anyone avoid suffering the same grief I did. Kinda blunt and crass, I know, but if you've been so plagued, screw politeness. Knowledge rocks!! I'll share. ;)

nb ---> notbob at q dot com

[Rick Samuel]

One question not asked, why do your boards fail? SWMBO boards are 30 yo or better.

[Lew Hodgett]

What do you want to bet there is a dishwasher involved?

Lew

[SonomaProducts.com]

Unless you live the Amish life, you are eating mineral oil everyday. It is sprayed on rice to stop dust, gel caps for pills are made from it, hundreds of foods use it in their coatings. And it is available in the pharmacy to be used as a stool softner taken straight.

It is > >

[SonomaProducts.com]

And even then it is the heat of the diswasher, not the water that degrades the glue.

[Ed Pawlowski]

I don't doubt you had problems, but you are one in a million or a billion or a bazillion. The rest of us don't have the same reaction from trace amounts that a cutting board may give.

[Doug Miller]

Phooey. If the wood is properly dried, properly jointed, and properly glued, there's absolutely no need for "stainless steel tension members".

*Any* waterproof glue comes under the category of "properly glued".

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Most vegetable oils will become rancid in fairly short order. Finish with mineral oil, or with walnut oil.

[Leon]

Actully if you take all of the precautions that you mentioned and build a butcher block style cutting board, "with end grain pointing up" the likely hood of the joints and or wood splitting increase dramatically. The end grain will soak up enough liquids and oils that it will eventually swell and can crack. I have a mobile butcher block that I build almost 30 years ago that split for the reason mentioned after about 6 years of use. Rods added through the center have prevented this from reoccouring. If your cutting board uses the side or edge of the wood for the cutting surface glue is all that you should need.

That is not true. My wife has never used anything but vegetable oil on the butcher block and there has never been a problem with anything going rancid, at least in the last 30 years. While mineral oil and or a butcher block oil may be a better choice, vegetable oil has done just fine for us.

[Lee Michaels]

"Leon" wrote

Perhaps your wife has a magic touch in the kitchen?? :-)

[Leon]

That and she cleans the top after every use. I shutter to think that some one would not. Perhaps the oil gets thinned down from use.

[Doug Miller]

Indeed that's true -- which is one reason I don't build cutting boards that way. The other reason is I don't like the look.

Yep, I can see that. More trouble than it's worth IMO -- easier, and (again, IMO) better looking to use strips, with the edge grain up.

Agreed.

OK, perhaps I should have said "may become rancid". Still better to use an oil that eventually dries; walnut, being a food product, is of course completely food-safe. Or leave it unfinished, and dress it with a card scraper every now and again.

[Leon]

Actually that other way, with end grain up is the better way, the cuts in the wood are "self healing' so to speak, and knives stay sharper longer.

Better lookiing until they get used a lot. Along with that 30 year old butcher block that has never had to be resurfaced, we have an edge grain maple cutting board that I made in Jr. High. I have had to resurface it numerous times.

I think the "vegetable oil" thing is much like the "Swine Flu", it gets much more bad talk than it poses as an actual mass threat.

[mac davis]

IMHO, if "food safe" is that important, drill the suckers for through bolts and just worry about rust..

I'd worry more about the bacteria and other goodies that grow in cutting boards than in the glue used.. YMWV

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> gave the plastic resin glue (urea formaldehyde) a non-toxic in its

mac

Please remove splinters before emailing

[RicodJour]

Nice - way to rain on the "sky is falling" parade. It's killjoys like you that insert pragmatism and rational thinking into such threads that take all the fun out of scaring the poop out of people. ;)

R

[SonomaProducts.com]

[Lew Hodgett]

Let's see now, my slab of plastic doesn't need to be oiled, will go in the dishwasher if desired, doesn't damage knife edge during use, can be sterilized with household bleach.

That just about covers all my needs for a cutting board, but as a work of art, it sucks.

Lew