OK, I changed my mind again. Went to a local drug store and they were out of their budget bottles of mineral oil, but I was still uncertain anyway. Read a lot of stuff online on the subject and I'm inclined right now to agree with this post, which spells out THIS opinion (using nothing is the best defense against bacteria) better than any other I've seen:
Message 11 >I have a cutting board project started and need to know what kind of
I can't remember where I read it ("Science News," I think, so it was a summary of the original report), but a study was done at a university about that. The bottom line was that bacteria and other bugs were least likely to grow and do their evil stuff if a cutting board of untreated wood were used. Plastic apparently was the worst. I think one of the suggestions was that the tannic acid in the wood acted like a natural antiseptic or something like that. They specifically recommended *not* to treat the wood of a cutting board if you're interested in keeping the bacteria count down. Gee. Like, there are people out there who want it to be high, maybe?
Mark
Mark J. Cintala | I speak for myself, I guess. snipped-for-privacy@iwl.net | Wait a minute -- lemme check...