by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
The good old cutting board is one of our most durable household goods and it has proven its worth through times and ages, especially when made from good wood. Properly cared for it will go through generations without complaining of breaking.
As a refresher, it is generally considered advisable to have at least two cutting boards, kept separate, so to speak, in your kitchen. One of those should should be designated for raw meat, seafood, and poultry, and kept for that purpose only and the other board(s) for everything else. This helps avoid cross-contamination for purposes of health (keeping bacteria from sneaking into our produce, bread, and other non-fleshy items) and for purposes of hospitality (vegetarians and vegans will thank you).
In fact, this question of bacteria helps answer your question about plastic vs. wood. Plastic gained favor for a while because it is non-porous and dishwasher-safe, two qualities that made it seem like a healthier, cleaner choice. But it seems this was just another PR coup by the plastics industry.
According to research, including a study at the UC-Davis Food Safety Laboratory, wood wins the bacteria battle hands down. While bacteria such as salmonella and listeria are easy to clean off brand-new plastic boards, these boards become, so say the researchers, “impossible to clean and disinfect manually” once damaged by knives. In other words, the sneaky little bacteria hide out in the cracks and crevices. Wood cutting boards provide a home for bacteria too, but only for a very short time, and the little critters actually scoot down under the surface and die.
Many woods, in fact, have very high antibacterial and antiviral properties, such as the much maligned Sycamore, for example, which has one of the if not indeed the highest. Maligned, in Britain, for the fact that it is not a “native” tree and that is spreads somewhat like a weed. It has been in Britain for almost 2000 years, having brought here by the Romans and thus, I should think, we really should give it citizenship.
This makes wood more or less magical and if you buy a cutting board made from sustainably harvested sources – sorry, but forget the bamboo notion – it is definitely a greener choice than oil-based old plastic.
Once there are too many cuts showing on the surface of your wooden cutting boards or they have become excessively worn or have developed hard-to-clean grooves there still is no need to throw them away, even though the food safety people may say so. All you have to do is sand them smooth again or, if need be, planed down a bit, and they are ready to roll and entirely safe again.
So, if you have old wooden cutting boards rejuvenate them with some sanding and giving them a coat of vegetable (or mineral oil) and they will be yours to use, safely, and will last for many generations to come. The reason I put mineral oil in brackets is for the fact that – personally – I do not like using it simply because it is oil-based, as in the black stuff coming out of the ground. Some people claim that vegetable oil goes rancid but I have not found this to be a problem.
© 2017
