What wood are cutting boards made from? Wood for the production of end cutting boards, professional boards. "Bacteria dangerous to humans accumulate in wooden cutting boards due to the porosity of the material."
Wooden cutting board is the perfect choice for the kitchen
A kitchen board is an indispensable attribute of any kitchen, without which no self-respecting cook can do. Modern manufacturers offer wide selection cutting boards made from various materials and with different configurations. Boards can even be built-in and move along the edge of the sink. Everything possible is done so that the cooking process causes only positive emotions. In spite of great amount diversified different materials, wooden cutting boards remain the most popular, safe and convenient.
Why is wood the best material?
Wood has always been considered the best natural material for production. kitchen utensils. What is the reason for such popularity? First of all, wood products are distinguished by a special lively warmth that gives positive energy and has a beneficial effect on human health.
Products from natural materials environmentally friendly and do not emit harmful substances, which is very important for the preparation of quality food. Some varieties of trees have an antibacterial effect. Bacteria and fungi do not multiply on cutting boards made from such wood.
Chopping wooden boards serve as a wonderful decoration for the interior of the kitchen and create cozy atmosphere. decorative look such products are given painting or the new kind decorations - decoupage. You can buy beautiful decorative wooden boards for a gift.
What wood is used to make kitchen boards?
There are more than a thousand species of trees growing on the planet. The wood of many of them is used by a person for personal purposes. Each tree has its own properties and is used for specific purposes. What breeds are used to make cutting boards?
Pine
- inexpensive but enough soft material, possessing curative action. Phytoncides secreted by pine wood kill microbes and have a beneficial effect on human organs. The release of useful substances does not stop even after processing the pine. The disadvantage of this lumber is its fragility.Larch
- valuable and durable material, resistant to dampness and reproduction of various putrefactive fungi. Beautiful colour and good structure makes larch one of the best materials for making wood cutting boards.Beech
- hardwood, different pink and unusual pattern. However, beech also has a disadvantage - it absorbs moisture well. That is why beech products are varnished. Cutting boards made from this lumber are used only for cutting dry products.Oak
- the most durable and durable material. Oak kitchen board is not afraid of dampness and will serve for a long time. During operation, wood will not emit harmful substances, does not lose its attractive appearance and it cracks and doesn't dry out.Nut
- moderately solid material, which is easy to process and has a smooth and coarse texture. Kitchen boards made of walnut are not afraid of moisture and have high wear resistance.Ash
- a material that is not inferior in strength to oak, but has its own characteristics: expressive texture, moisture resistance, resistance to deformation.Cherry
- beautiful material, possessing high density, which in its own way decorative qualities outperforms all lumber used to make kitchen boards.
Regardless of the type of wood, everything perfectly absorbs odors, so it is recommended to have several boards: for meat, fish, bread and vegetables. It is recommended to purchase a set of cutting boards and use each element strictly for its intended purpose.
A few secrets of choosing a cutting board made of wood
There are several secrets that will help to make right choice. First of all, when buying such a kitchen attribute, you need to carefully look at its appearance. This will allow us to draw some conclusions. Yes, cutting boards natural array trees have a solid woody pattern.
Kitchen boards made from narrow strips - plots - gained wide popularity. Such products will last much longer in the kitchen than boards made of solid wood with proper care. They cannot be left in a humid environment for a long time, which can lead to delamination and the ingress of wood particles into food.
Professional chefs in most cases use the so-called end cutting boards, in which the fibers are not parallel to the cutting surface, but perpendicular to it. This surface is more durable and strong. Knives when using the end board require less sharpening, which is very important for cooks who prepare dishes throughout the day.
Olive oil is the best material for impregnating kitchen boards
Cutting boards should be impregnated to extend their lifespan. vegetable oils. Olive oil - the best option for impregnation, the use of which will lead to the achievement of the following goals:
- does not spoil the appearance kitchen board;
- no harm to health;
- increases the service life of the product.
At proper care wooden cutting boards will last long years to their owners and make the cooking process enjoyable.
If the kitchen in the home is regularly used for its intended purpose, then it simply cannot do without cutting boards. Yes, yes, exactly the boards, because according to the rules of hygiene on ordinary kitchen separate work surfaces should be used for cutting fish, meat, vegetables and bread. In comparison, catering establishments should have at least a dozen professional wood cutting boards.
What wood are cutting boards made from?
At first glance, it may seem that all wooden boards are exactly the same and little depends on the type of wood. But this is only at the very first glance. In fact, it is the type of wood from which it is made cutting board, determines how long it will retain its appearance and performance. So, it is not for nothing that professional chefs prefer to use cutting boards made of bamboo, oak, acacia or hevea - all these types of wood are highly resistant to moisture vapor and mechanical damage. But such pleasure is also not cheap. It will be somewhat more economical to purchase a set of cutting boards made of pine, beech or ash wood.
How to choose a cutting board made of wood?
In order for the cutting board to please the eye and hands for more than one month, it is necessary to choose it armed with the following recommendations.
From this list, only oak and bamboo are suitable for the manufacture of boards, while they have certain disadvantages. Everything else on the list is useless. Pine - because of the resin contained in the wood, everything chopped will smell like pine needles. Beech (as well as willow, linden, alder) are soft or decay-resistant rocks, boards made of them are short-lived. Birch has an untidy appearance due to fading and a large number knots. The best tree species for wooden boards are Maple, Walnut, Paduk, Mahogany, Sapele, Teak and many others.
"Bacteria dangerous to humans accumulate in wooden cutting boards due to the porosity of the material."
Porous wood does absorb bacteria, but the effect is the opposite. The wood is extremely aggressive external environment for food bacteria, as opposed to synthetic materials. Scientists have proven that upper layer wooden cutting board (3 mm) has bright antiseptic properties, bacteria die in the wood. In the deeper layers, bacteria can indeed accumulate and survive, but they are buried there forever (they cannot get out).
“The tree absorbs the juice of vegetables, the blood of cut meat.”
Wood is a very delicate material that is afraid of water. It is enough to take care of your cutting board, treating it with mineral oil or ointment from time to time. This will create a barrier for moisture, and therefore for vegetable juice, blood, and everything else.
“In the kitchen, you need to have at least 6 cutting boards for each type of food: fish, meat, vegetables and fruits, bread, butter, cheese, eggs, etc.”
Having to have 6 cutting boards is very controversial issue. The primary source of this recommendation is GOSTs of the times Soviet Union. It must be admitted that the Soviet sanitary standards were really severe and good. So good that the current SanPiN standards are based on Soviet standards. And they have a requirement to have 6 cutting boards per restaurant kitchens. But restaurant regulations are one thing, and your kitchen is another. If you begin to comply with the requirements of SanPiN in relation to your kitchen, you will have a hard time (you will have to get a separate sink for washing eggs, and a countertop and kitchen furniture make from of stainless steel). There are regulations in other countries, and here it becomes interesting. Requirements for restaurants and recommendations for customers there are different: 2 cutting boards. One for ready-to-eat food, the other for raw food. In our opinion, such a recommendation is the most correct for home conditions.
"The hygienic properties of plastic boards are better than those of wood."
It's a delusion. We know that plastic doesn't absorb water, but wood does, and we intuitively believe that this makes plastic cutting boards safe and wooden cutting boards dangerous. Plastic boards were the only ones allowed for use in catering in the USA and the USSR, and no research on this topic was conducted. It wasn't until the 1990s that experiments showed that wooden boards (both old and new) kill bacteria, while plastic boards are hygienic only as long as they don't get scratched. Scratches appear - and they become a breeding ground for bacteria that no washing will help. Since these studies were scientifically sound, the United States began to recommend wooden boards along with plastic ones. Alas, Russian regulations still require the use of plastic in catering.
“The cutting board should fit in the sink. The end board is too big.”
When you think about it, the requirement to put the cutting board in the sink is ridiculous. You don't try to put it in the sink kitchen table? (I wish I could see that!) You just wipe it off with a sponge, rag, or paper towel. A massive cutting board is no different. You wipe it like a kitchen table or countertop. Believe me, there is nothing to worry about!
“The end boards have adhesive seams on the work surface, as a result of which glue particles can get into the food.”
This is generally true. The seams are really located on the work surface. And the glue particles do get into the food. Everything that the knife touches gets into the food (parts of the knife, by the way, too). If you cut to plastic board, microscopic grains of plastic get into the food. If on wood - grains of wood and glue. Therefore, when manufacturing wooden boards, it is very important to use safe wood, safe maintenance oil, and safe glue. And we dare to assure you, this glue is absolutely safe for health. Most of the end boards (at least in our range) are made with Titebond glue, which is approved worldwide for the production of products in contact with food.
“The end board will not last long, because constantly in contact with water and being physically exposed to a knife and a chop hammer, it will gradually begin to crack in the places where the bars are glued.”
If you do not show respect for the end board - do not care for it, pour water on it, chop bones on it with a butcher's hatchet, then it will probably crack or crack. But by no means in the places where the bars are glued! The adhesive used is monstrously strong and the end board can break anywhere but where it is glued.
"A wooden board must be impregnated with sunflower oil."
Soak in oil - yes. Sunflower - no way. Sunflower (and olive) oil deteriorates over time, regardless of the degree of purification. A cutting board soaked in this oil, after 1-2 years, acquires bad smell rancid spoiled oil. It is impossible to get rid of this smell, and the board will have to be thrown away. It is best to use mineral oil or a special ointment for prevention.
"The cutting board must have a drain chute along the edge of the work surface."
The gutter at first glance seems attractive idea. It retains juice from meat, fruits and vegetables, and does not spread all over the table. But the downsides of the gutter abound. Firstly, it will interfere with the brushing of chopped food and debris. Secondly, moisture will accumulate in it, which can become a problem with germs. (A hard-to-reach wet spot - oh, germs will be happy!) It's okay to have a separate cutting board for grilled chicken or pineapple. But the main board should still be without such a gutter.
"Wooden boards lose to plastic, as wood has the ability to absorb odors."
The ability of wood to absorb odors is exaggerated. To remove the smell of garlic, onion or fish, there are three simple ways: lemon, coarse salt and soda. Rub the surface of the board with one thing, wait a few minutes, brush off the residue, rinse and dry the board.
Good day, glad to see you on the blog pages))
Since I am a big fan of various household trifles, which are often made fun of at home, then, accordingly, my interest in these trifles is inexhaustible, well, at home I have quite a few of them by itself))
But even among this small things there are irreplaceable "representatives" without which, if it is possible to do it, it will be very uncomfortable to do so. Today it is about such items - cutting boards for the kitchen.
If you ask yourself the question “how many cutting boards should be in the kitchen”, then, in principle, you can completely get by with only two boards:
- for products that need to be thermally processed before eating;
- and another one for foods that can be eaten raw.
But this is the most necessary minimum, nothing less. Because chicken meat, for example, is not only not recommended to be cut on the same board with other products, it even needs to be stored far from the rest and even tightly packed.
And if you want to have more than minimum set from two boards - it will be right decision because it is desirable to have a separate board for cutting fish, fish usually has a strong specific smell that is difficult to wash and weather; a small board for bread, and for vegetables and herbs, on the contrary, a little more, otherwise it’s inconvenient to cut them.
In my opinion, it is optimal to have 4-5 boards of different “styles” and made of different materials for the kitchen, because there is no material that will be unambiguously the best, each has its pros and cons.
You can decide which cutting board is best for the kitchen only by trying to work with them, and I will share with you my opinion based on repeated testing and replacing the boards, maybe you will find something useful for yourself.
Two main competitors for the first place in the ranking "best cutting board" share boards made of wood and plastic.
Wooden cutting boards
They have undeniable advantages: comfortable, pleasant to the touch and use.
They have bactericidal properties and have a quite decent appearance for a long time, since they are able to self-repair - the scratches on them are smoothed out as if "tightening".
Wooden boards are durable in use.
Wooden boards do not dull knives, products do not slip on them, plus such boards are not expensive. But all this provided that it was used for manufacturing quality material from hard rock trees - oak, beech, ash, yew, cherry, acacia, and the hardest are boards made of coconut, ebony and guaiac wood.
If the board quickly takes on an unimportant appearance, the tree begins to crumble, then immediately transfer it to the category of boards for cutting bread and laying out hot pastries (it will smell nice on a wooden board)).
Cons of wooden boards:
Such boards strongly absorb odors.
They are more difficult to keep properly clean.
If the tree is of poor quality or the board is made of softwood (aspen, birch, spruce, pine, poplar, alder, willow), chips will soon break off when cut, which can get into food.
Wooden boards are not too fond of water, so soak them and wash them in dishwashers Not recommended.
A wooden board should not be used when cutting raw products, because after using and washing the board it is very desirable to additionally rinse it hot water, and not every wooden board will be able to endure such a “washing”.
Now there is no wooden board in my collection, I used it for quite a long time, the wood there was not the best, but I will not refuse to buy a wooden board again, especially from hardwoods.
Bamboo boards
These are not exactly wooden boards, or rather, not at all from wood)) but they are very similar to them. Bamboo is a grassy material and the technology for making kitchen helpers from it is more complicated than that of wooden ones. They are made from bamboo stems cut into thin strips, glued together and pressed.
Its advantages: the board is beautiful, reliable in operation, easy to clean, practically does not absorb odors and moisture.
The main thing when buying a bamboo board is to choose a conscientious manufacturer so that formaldehyde glue is not used in its manufacture. This is perhaps the most important drawback.
I do not use wooden and bamboo boards for cutting raw meat and fish, I cut ready-made products, fruits and vegetables on it.
I have been using a bamboo board for a long time and with pleasure, my mother gave it to me about eleven years ago, but the duration of operation did not affect its appearance too much, perhaps because the board in the kitchen is far from alone.
Plastic cutting boards
They are very democratic: inexpensive, easy to care for, resistant to temperatures, practically do not absorb odors.
There are a wide variety of shapes and sizes, recently they have been made with convenient additions. The last one I bought (currently my favorite) has a recess into which it is convenient to shift already cut products.
Cons: the plastic may be of poor quality and then the board will quickly return to its original appearance, and the plastic fibers will again be “cut off” along with the cut product and can get into food.
If you had to decide which cutting boards are better than wooden or plastic, then I would divide the prize for two, they are equally good, but each in its own way, so both of them are worthy of settling in your kitchen.
But if you do not have a single board, but you need to buy only one, first buy a plastic one, it is more versatile.
Flexible cutting boards review
Such boards include silicone mats and boards made of thin plastic. Silicone is a wonderful material that is easy to clean and easy to use, and calmly tolerates any temperature, and it is convenient to store it - you can simply roll it into a tube.
I don’t have such a board in my kitchen yet, but I plan to purchase it, of course)) The alleged minus is that it’s not very convenient to move it from place to place with already cut products, they will roll towards the center. As far as this is really a minus I will tell after the acquisition and operation.
In the meantime, about similar boards, they are made of plastic, not quite similar to silicone, but still very close in characteristics - about flexible plastic boards.
I ordered on Aliexpress a set of four cutting boards designed for cutting meat, chicken, fish and vegetables. I donated two of them and enjoy the rest.
For me, their main advantage is a large working surface they are lightweight and take up little space.
Very easy to wash.
It is not difficult to carry products on such a plan of flexible boards because they are not as soft as silicone ones.
Best suited for cutting "bulk" products,.
Resistant in operation, they retain a decent appearance for a long time, the main thing is to cut from the side that is intended for this, since paint is applied on the back, which is erased from the knife. In order for us not to get confused, the manufacturer signed the right side))
Cons: I don't know. Well, unless they last as long as wooden or marble ones.
My impressions: good, inexpensive board, would buy again.
Convenient and useful household trifles for you 🙂
- Material selection
- Made from solid material: saw cut wood, wide board or plywood sheet
- Step 1: design
- Step 2: Preparing the Tools
- Step 3: woodworking
- Step 4: details
- Step 5: Protection
- How to make a board from fragments
- More ideas
The cutting board should be clean and sturdy. It can perform 2 functions: to be a decorative accessory, to serve as a cooking appliance.
Creating a kitchen board - creative process, which does not have a clear algorithm.
What can be a cutting board
The technical composition must be free of toxic impurities.
The groups are fastened with clamps, aligned with slats in the upper and lower planes (see photo).
When the glue dries, the group blanks are ground and planed to give evenness.
Dividing a large board into narrow fragments allows you to process workpieces on machines. They are guided by the width of the working areas of the planing equipment.
The processed group blanks are leveled in thickness, glued, lubricating the side ends with glue, and the structure is fixed with clamps.
Step 5: trimming and final sanding
When the glue dries, cut the board to the right sizes, sand the surface again. Corners can be rounded with a router.
A small groove is cut around the perimeter of the board. There will accumulate juice formed when cutting products.
Step 6: oil treatment
The finished product is treated with oil.
In a similar way, a board is made from fragments of any shape.
More ideas
For boards, you can use snags, unusual fragments of wood. Sometimes clear forms are avoided, they manage with grinding and impregnation of the product with protective oil.
In the finished board, you can cut a hole to remove scraps, grind the cut, attach legs to the board, and so on.
Care
Wooden boards absorb odors and accumulate bacteria. To prevent this from happening, it is necessary to carry out grinding, impregnate the product with oil at least 3 times a year. The service life of the board will increase.