It took more than 300 strokes on each board before I began to notice a slight dulling on the knife that was used against the edge-grain board. What we didn't like: Nothingthis board is absolutely worth investing in. There are lots of oil, wax, and oil-and-wax options on the market to protect your wooden cutting board, but food-grade mineral oil is always a great option. Here are notes on the other models we tested for this review: All it takes to clean a wooden cutting board is hot water and dish soap. It's not ideal, since the feet themselves aren't of high quality and can come off over time, and they render one side of the board unusable. But as scratches pile up, plastic begins to look less appealing. Climate Pledge Friendly uses sustainability certifications to highlight products that support our commitment to help preserve the natural world. What's the Best Type of Wood for Cutting Boards? I could have abused all of the boards mercilessly to see which would fail first, but that didn't seem fairone of the rules of wooden cutting board use is to care for them properly. Knives get all the attention, with their different shapes, sizes, metal types, and blade geometries to choose from. This helps prevent the board from getting damp on its underside, which will eventually lead to warping and other problems. The edge-grain board (top) has end-grain sides, while the end-grain board (bottom) has edge-grain sides. Cutting boards can be made in a range of hardwood types. The Best End-Grain Wooden Cutting Board: The BoardSmith Maple Carolina Slab Butcher Block, Another Great End-Grain Cutting Board: Brooklyn Butcher Block End-Grain Maple, The Best Edge-Grain Cutting Board: Brooklyn Butcher Block Long-Grain Maple, The Best Affordable Wooden Cutting Board: Ironwood Gourmet Acacia End-Grain Prep Station, We Tested 7 Plastic Cutting BoardsHere Are Our Favorites, The Criteria: What We Look for in a Great Wooden Cutting Board. We tested both an end- and an edge-grain maple board from them (more on the edge-grain below), and each is a work of art. More affordable than an end-grain board, this edge-grain number from Brooklyn Butcher Block is thinner and lighter, but still solid and very well made. Wood is, by its nature, prone to warping and cracking. The workmanship is self-evident: The wood has been sanded to a fine finish, the edges and corners have been neatly beveled, and the wood pieces themselves are all pristine, with no major cracks, chips, dents, or knots to be seen. We suggest going with the 16-by-22-inch board. Strangely, the John Boos end-grain maple board performed worse than Boos' edge-grain alternative, with the knife used on the end-grain board growing dull before the 300-stroke mark, while the edge-grain was less severely dulled at that point. They also have a lot more glued seams compared to the long strips of wood that make up an edge-grain board. In my home use, it's never bothered me too much, and the board has tolerated use on only one side without showing any detrimental wear or warping as a result, but if you wanted, you could just take them off and try to sand away any remaining adhesive. There they remain, locked away until they die. After viewing product detail pages, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in. It's also been time-tested by the author for three-plus years of heavy home use, so we know that with proper care, this board can last. Because a cutting board is used for food prep, manufacturers can't rely on the full spectrum of glues, varnishes, lacquers, and other products to shore up fundamental weaknesses and ensure the product holds together despite them. This is a key pointthere's no type of wooden cutting board that is guaranteed not to fail. But on average, that's how it'll go. What we liked: If the fancier end-grain cutting boards above just aren't in your budget, this end-grain acacia wood board will serve you more than well enough. Oak is one material I didn't consider at all, since I found no credible sources that would endorse it for cutting boards. The feet confer a couple advantages. Compare the finishes on these two boards, both maple. Unlike many other lower quality wooden products, cutting boards don't have a lot to hide behind. A little over a year ago, I ordered new maple end-grain cutting boards for the brand new test kitchen at Serious Eats. You can't see this because the fibers are practically microscopic, but if you could zoom in, it'd look like a knife sliding between brush bristles, which close back up as soon as they knife is lifted away. What we didn't like: One thing worth noting is that this board comes with small foam-rubber anti-slip feet on one side. End-grain boards, like the one at left, absorb liquids more rapidly than edge-grain ones do. Wood fares better in the minimizing-damage-to-a-knife's-edge departmentbetter than a lot of plastic options, better than composite materials, and infinitely better than glass or marble (please, never cut on glass or stone)but not all wooden cutting boards are the same in this regard. Maple is one of the most common materials for cutting boards, and I mostly limited much of my testing pool to that, though I did include a few teak boards and one acacia, since they're popular options on the more affordable end. In theory, an end-grain board will be gentler on your knife than an edge-grain board will, and teak will wear down a blade faster than maple. If youre concerned about cross-contamination, its perfectly fine to have multiple cutting boards and designate one specifically for use with meats. If a company is cutting these obvious corners, there's good reason to suspect they're cutting other ones as wellones that relate directly to the longevity of the board. But if you spend money on a bad one, you'll curse yourself every time you chop an onion on it. My BoardSmith board at home has bowed downward ever so slightly in the center, likely as a result of the feet, though it's very minor and not noticeable when using it. Better end-grain boards use bigger pieces of wood to minimize the number of seams and stagger the courses so that the seams don't all converge in a cross. The acacia wood is noticeably harder under a knife than a maple board, but it also seems to be more durable. Sounds like an end-grain board is better then, right? Breaking that rule just to force a failure would only prove which board could withstand the worst treatment the longest, not which one would last longest when treated properly. The BoardSmith Maple Carolina Slab Butcher Block, Ironwood Gourmet Acacia End-Grain Prep Station, how to treat a wooden cutting board right, Michigan Maple's End Grain Chopping Block, Catskill Craftsmen's 19-Inch End Grain Chopping Block, John Boos Thick Reversible Maple Cutting Board, John Boos Maple Classic Reversible Wood End Grain Chopping Block, https://www.canr.msu.edu/news/cutting_boards_and_food_safety_1. How finely has the board been finished? Cookies collect information about your preferences and your device and are used to make the site work as you expect it to, to understand how you interact with the site, and to show advertisements that are targeted to your interests. Sufficient real estate is essential for a neat and organized workspace. How to Season and Maintain a Wooden Cutting Board, We Tested 8 Fine-Mesh StrainersThese Are Our Favorites, We Tested 10 Balloon WhisksTwo Whisked Their Way to Victory, We Tested 30 Chef's KnivesHere Are Our Favorites, We Tested 10 Microplanes (Rasp-Style Graters)Here Are the Best Ones, We Tested 14 Sets of Steak KnivesHere Are Our Favorites, We Tested 16 Santoku KnivesHere Are Our Favorites, The Best Serrated Bread Knife for Your Kitchen, The Kitchen Starter Kit: Essential Tools for Every Cook, The Essential Knives Every Home Cook Needs, We Tested 11 Food ProcessorsHere Are the 4 Worth Buying, We Tested More Than 20 Pepper MillsHere Are The Best Ones. Seams are frequent points of failure, which puts end-grain boards at higher risk (assuming equal construction and material quality). And, by lifting the board up, they make it easier to slip your fingers under to pick the board up and move it around. Shop products from small business brands sold in Amazons store. Our favorite end-grain wooden cutting board is the The BoardSmith Maple Carolina Slab Butcher Block. For most folks, I'd suggest splitting the difference and getting the 16-by-22-inch board, unless your kitchen is very large or very small. How the pieces are arranged is also telling: Is it in a classic bricklayer's pattern, which offsets each coarse of wood from the next, or are they aligned, such that all the seams meet like four-way intersections? What we liked: The boards from Brooklyn Butcher Block impressed us just as much as the ones from The BoardSmith. As I've written in my review of plastic cutting boards, many of the assumptions about plastic being a more sanitary material than wood for cutting boards have been undermined by research. At a solid two-inches thick, it's also as sturdy as can be. I then slid each knife back and forth on each cutting board, using a consistent five-inch stroke length and 4.5-pounds of downward pressure. Like the edge-grain board recommended above, that's more than enough for regular longterm use. End-grain boards are also more prone to warping and cracking, since all those exposed fibers absorb and release moisture much more rapidly (one of their purposes in the tree was to transport water, after all). (As I said, there's more to it than that, but for the purposes of cutting boards, I'm limiting it to these two terms.). I've owned one at home for about five years now, and it hardly looks different from when it first arrived. Get fresh recipes, cooking tips, deal alerts, and more! Leave the board standing upright while air-drying to help avoid warping or pooled water.. They were also relatively affordable, which was appealing given that I was running up a pretty steep bill on new kitchen gear. That put them about on-par with the edge-grain Brooklyn Butcher Block maple board above. Wooden cutting boards of this size should be at least an inch and a half thick, if not thicker, to lessen the risk of warping. It'll ever-so-slightly wear down your blade faster than its end-grain counterpart, and it'll take on deeper scratches more readily, but in exchange you get a board that should be somewhat more resistant to splitting and warping over time, which is good if you're not likely to oil it regularly. The main test I wanted to run for this review was the knife-dulling one, to see just how much end- versus edge-grain and different wood types damaged a factory-sharpened edge. Did the manufacturer go above and beyond on the smaller touches, beveling the edges and corners? This will wear down the blade somewhat faster, and it'll lead to gashes in the wood that won't heal so easily. We put a range of wooden board materials, constructions, and brands to the test to find out which ones were worth the investment. We also like the Ironwood Gourmet Acacia End-Grain Prep Station, which is our budget-friendly pick. Ziruma Large End Grain Teak Wood Cutting Board (20x15x2 in.) Or are you going to neglect it the same way you've neglected those fancy knives you should have resharpened four years ago? The harder acacia wood will be a little less gentle on your knife blades, but not so much that you should rule it out. Because it's a small company, The BoardSmith can also make boards to custom specs, including different sizes and wood types. I have cherry countertops in my home kitchen, but I've always made a point of not cutting directly on them; the wood is noticeably softer and easier to ding and dent than my maple cutting boards, so I'd agree that it's not the best for a true work surface, though a skilled woodworker may know how to pick cherry wood that's harder than what's typical. End-grain boards are more difficult to make, which means they're more expensive than an edge-grain board of otherwise similar build and material quality. Cook a ton? Some looked just like the ones that had failed us before, some were works of art, and a few fell in between. We've updated our Privacy Policy, which will go in to effect on September 1, 2022. The board I have at home has them, while the board I ordered to test for this review did not (I requested they be left off). Unfortunately, those two qualities are hard to come by. Is the surface smooth or rough? For one thing, you can look at the outward signs of quality. In the world of cutting boards, shoddy craftsmanship will frequently reveal itself over time. What we liked: If you're interested in an edge-grain board, Brooklyn Butcher Block's option is reasonably priced and very well made. A 4.5-pound skillet helped us maintain an even downward pressure on each knife, while a ruler (in the background) allowed us to keep a consistent stroke length. This means it'll dull your knife faster than their end-grain option, but in a real-world situation where you wouldn't just run a blade back and forth repeatedly with so much pressure, it'd take even longer. Those intersections where four pieces of wood come together are particularly weak. Discover more about the small businesses partnering with Amazon and Amazons commitment to empowering them. Daniel joined the Serious Eats culinary team in 2014 and writes recipes, equipment reviews, articles on cooking techniques. Are you really going to saturate your cutting board regularly with food-grade mineral oil to keep it quenched and less susceptible to warping, cracking, and water damage? On the flip side, wood requires more careful maintenance and frequent oiling, and, unlike some more durable plastic boards, can never be put in the dishwasher. There are exceptions when it comes to wooden cutting boards, but, in general, this is a piece of equipment you're better off paying more for.
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