How To Maintain Your Wood Cutting Board
To avoid cracking, dryness, and warping of the wood cutting board, it’s best to oil the board once a month. Luckily, this task only takes a few minutes. First, meticulously clean your cutting board, preferably using the lemon and salt method described above . Then dry the board thoroughly.
To oil the board, you need to use a product specifically formulated for wood cutting boards, such as Howard Products Cutting Board Oil or even food grade mineral oil . Be sure not to use olive or avocado oil.
Use a soft cloth or paper towel in circular motions to buff the oil into the wood cutting board. Apply a thin coat to the entire surface, front and back, as well as the sides. Let the oil soak for a few hours or even overnight.
For Cleaning Oiling And Waxing
- A bench scraper or metal spatula: This is used to gently scrape off stuck-on food or to remove dried salt .
- A sponge: We like Scotch-Brite Heavy Duty Scrub Sponges.
- A clean dish towel and paper towels: The Williams-Sonoma All Purpose Pantry Towels are our favorite for soaking up as much water from the board as possible before letting it air-dry. Use paper towels to apply mineral oil or wax to your board.
- Food-grade mineral oil, beeswax, or a blend:Howard Cutting Board Oil or Claphams Beeswax Salad Bowl Finish both work well, but any brand will doas long as its food-safe.
- Kosher salt and a lemon or distilled white vinegar: This is used to deodorize your board if its stinky.
- Baking soda: This will remove tough stains from your board.
How Do You Remove Black Stains From A Wooden Cutting Board
Cutting boards are one of those weird kitchen products that no one really knows a ton about. We all have them, and we all have multiple of them. We do our very best to keep them clean, but sometimes spots and stains still happen, especially with wooden cutting boards. There are various ways to keep them clean, but one of the biggest questions is how you remove black stains from a wooden cutting board?
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Way 2 Deep Cleaning Solution Vinegar And Baking Soda:
A deep cleaning solution is required if your wooden cutting board has serious kinds of black stains and bacterial built-in. This cleaning solution will help the cutting board to get rid of the sour odor as well. For this solution, you will be needed vinegar and baking soda.
The antibacterial, antifungal, and acetic acid components in vinegar help to abolish the fungal attack of the cutting board with the help of baking soda. Apply the following steps to get a suitable result.
Step 1: Take equal proportionate white vinegar and baking soda in two different cups.
Step 2: Then pour a cup of baking soda thoroughly on the surface of the board. Take the cup of vinegar and apply it on the surface as well.
Step 3: To make the formula efficient, wait for a few minutes. After that, give the wooden cutting board a gentle and effective rinse. The black stains might already be gone by the time.
Step 4: To prevent your cutting board to absorb water furthermore, give it a good massage with neutral or mineral oil.
Should You Season Your Cutting Board
And the most important part of taking care of a wooden cutting board is seasoning it. So youll be pleased to know that when you buy a wooden cutting board from us, its already been seasoned for you. With a wooden cutting board or carving/butcher block, its important to re-season every once in a while.
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Clean Your Board With Oil
The thing about using oil to clean your board is that you have to use enough to make it stay clean, but not too much that the oil will wipe away the boards flavor. So if you use too much, the oil will end up getting on the board, and you will end up with a dull surface that needs to be re-oiled to keep it clean. If you use too little, the board is left with a grimy surface that wont clean up nicely.
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How To Clean Chopping Boards
- 14 Apr 2021
Your chopping board is one piece of kitchenware that gets a regular workout, so you have to keep clean to avoid food contamination. There are several methods you can use to clean both wooden and plastic chopping boards, and most of what you need is likely already in your pantry!
Bicarbonate of soda: Mix one tablespoon of bi-carb soda, one tablespoon of salt and one tablespoon of water to form a paste. Give your chopping board a good scrub with the paste, then rinse thoroughly with hot water and dry. For a more effective cleaner, add a little white vinegar and lemon juice.
Bicarbonate of soda
Vinegar: This is great for disinfecting as the acid in it helps combat nasty bugs such as E.coli, Salmonella and Staphylococcus. After washing your board, disinfect by giving it a wipe with full-strength, white vinegar. You can also deodorise the board by sprinkling bicarbonate of soda followed by a spray of white vinegar. Leave for 10 minutes, whilst it foams up, then rinse off with a cloth.
Hydrogen peroxide: Its recommended to use 3% hydrogen peroxide for chopping boards that are used for chopping up raw meat. Spray enough hydrogen peroxide around the chopping board for it get into the cuts and rub it in with a clean cloth. Rinse with water and then dry.
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Way 1 Natural Solution Clean With Lemon And Salt:
You can adopt many natural solutions to get rid of the black stain. One of the popular natural solutions to come out of this problem is using lemon and salt. For not so severe condition, these ingredients can be used regularly to alleviate the spreading of the black stains. Besides, both of the ingredients carry natural bleaching formula and works effectively together. Follow the steps to get a proper satisfying result.
Step 1: First, take a towel and wet it in hot water. Then wipe the wooden cutting board with the hot wet towel so it loses the bonds of the black stain caused by mold.
Step 2: Then take another dry towel and wipe the cutting board thoroughly and nicely to dry off the wet cutting board immediately.
Step 3: After that, grab some coarse salt and sprinkle it on the cutting board properly. Also, take a lemon and squeeze the juice over the cutting board.
Step 4: Then take half of the lemon and start to scrub the surface of the cutting board over and over with it until you think the black stain is removed. Make smaller circular motions while scrubbing. It will make sure that you covered every space of that cutting board.
Step 5: Next, you grab the hot wet towel again and wipe down all the salt and lemon from the cutting board. Then efface all the excess ingredients from the board with the dry towel. It will give your board an even smooth texture.
Unfortunately All That Slicing And Dicing Can Cause Mold To Build Up
Mold on cutting board. Oct 20 2007 0242 PM 3. Wash the board with soapy water rinse then treat with sanitizing solution. A wooden cutting board also attracts molds.
And then make VERY sure the board is dry after you use it and wipe it lay it upside down over night so there is no chance of water collecting in that groove. They stick to the surface no matter how many times you clean the board. After all its no use having even the fanciest set of kitchen knives without a great chopping board to use them with.
I cut up a cantaloupe on a plastic cutting board the other day. On plastic cutting boards the issue is usually caused by the sandpaper-like surface of the cutting board not being cleaned thoroughly enough between uses. We recently discovered some black stains on a bamboo cutting board.
If the mold problem on your cutting board is more severe salt and lemon probably wont be enough to get rid of it completely. Use either straight-up white vinegar or a solution of 1 12 teaspoons bleach in 4 cups of water. Oh my you have this amount of mold on a cutting board burn it thats the only way to get rid of the mold never use it again spores will be everywhere.
Let it sit for a minute or two and then wipe off the board. Check out our cutting board mold selection for the very best in unique or custom handmade pieces from our moulds shops. Silicone mold Cutting board cheese plate tray mold unique for resin cool mold unique.
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Wooden Cutting Board Care: How To Clean And Sanitize Insider
Wooden cutting boards made from resilient wood like maple, cherry, beech, or teak have a rustic and charming visual appeal that plastic and glass versions just can’t match. However, these kitchen tools require a fair amount of maintenance to stay in top working condition. < /…….
Wooden cutting boards made from resilient wood like maple, cherry, beech, or teak have a rustic and charming visual appeal that plastic and glass versions just cant match. However, these kitchen tools require a fair amount of maintenance to stay in top working condition.
Wood is an organic material thats sensitive to water damage, so if you want your wooden cutting board to last for years, youll need to wash it carefully, dry it thoroughly, and condition it to keep the wood supple and smooth.
To help explain exactly how to clean and care for a wooden cutting board, we enlisted the help of chef Benjamin Perez, owner of Bennys Bread and Butter in Edmonton, Alberta.
What Is Black Mold
Several types of mold are black. But when people refer to black mold, they most commonly mean Stachybotrys chartarum. This is a greenish-black mold that grows on wood, paper products, and cotton. Moisture is necessary for it to grow. This black mold can produce toxins that cause adverse health effects, including coughing, wheezing, and eye irritation. Some people are more sensitive to it than others.
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Causes Of Molds In Wood Cutting Boards
Wood cutting boards have been a familiar and ever-present food preparation aid in both home and commercial kitchens for many years. Whether you are dicing vegetables, slicing freshly baked bread, trimming fat from meats or preparing fresh fish fillets for broiling, you automatically reach for your favorite wooden cutting board. The attractive and diverse grains and surface textures of these boards of varied types of wood also make them appealing as natural kitchen decor accents when hung on kitchen walls or propped against your recently polished backsplash. Although chop boards made of synthetic plastics are practical and easy to clean and maintain, they lack the warmth, charm and appealing quality and character of natural wood.
What About Warped Or Cracked Boards
In most cases, once a board is warped or cracked, its better to get a new one. If you really want to repair your board, the pros recommend taking it to a professional woodworker rather than attempting to do it yourself. A woodworker will be able to take a cracked board apart, sand it down, remove the damaged area, and reassemble and refinish it. Certain wood fillers can be used to fill minor cracks. But LaRue told us that if a crack isnt properly cleaned and disinfected prior to filling, bacteria can migrate through the filler and/or wood back to the surface of the board. And for someone whos unfamiliar with fillers, they can be messy and tricky to use.
There are plenty of DIY YouTube demos on repairing warped boards , but ultimately we found them to be very hit or miss. There really are no guaranteed methods to get everything flat once again, Cox said. A professional can run a warped board through a wood planer, but there’s going to have to be some modification. Its going to become smaller either in thickness, or width, or length to remove whatever issue is present. Repairs can also be costly, so it may make more sense to just buy a new board. In our guide to the best cutting boards, we recommend boards that are at least 1½ inches thick because theyre far more resistant to warping than thinner boards.
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Spritz With Distilled White Vinegar
For a small amount of mold growth that has not left severe stains or penetrated the wood, distilled white vinegar can kill the spores. Use a spray bottle to lightly mist the wood with the vinegar. Allow the vinegar to air-dry on the surface for at least one hour. If there are no stains remaining, use a good wood cleaner, such as Scott’s Liquid Gold, to nourish the wood. Then, buff the surface with a soft cloth.
The Spruce / Georgia Lloyd
Way 4 Other Cleaning Solutions:
Besides, some other solutions can provide the same satisfying result in abolishing black stains from a wooden cutting board. The methods of applying these solutions are more or less the same. So, lets just know about the solutions.
a) Making a Paste of Bicarbonate Soda:
This bicarbonate soda can be turned into a paste by adding salt, vinegar, lemon, and the right amount of water. Use the paste as a scrubber and apply it following the same method that weve explained before.
b) Hydrogen Peroxide:
3 % of the hydrogen peroxide is okay to remove black stains. Especially, it helps in removing stains that happen because of the heavy thrashing of high-carbon stainless steel-made knives. You are supposed to spray the solution on the cutting board and rub the dark spots with a clean cloth. Then follow the same method as before.
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Cleaning Wood Cutting Boards With Dish Soap
Luckily, cleaning a wood cutting board by hand is easy enough. All you need is hot water , dish soap, and a brush or sponge. Rinse the board off with hot water and apply soap. You can use regular dish soap or antibacterial dish soap, if you want. Then scrub away! If you notice any knife marks, scratches or inconsistencies in the wood, make sure to give those areas an extra hard scrubbing.
Make sure to properly clean and scrub both sides of the board. Even if you only used one side to cut ondon’t forget that meat juices can drip and contaminate the other side. Finally, be sure to thoroughly rinse off each side with hot water. Then dry off the board with a cloth or paper towel. You can also drip dry in an upright position.
For The Love Of Clean Cutting Boards
A well-loved wood cutting board clocks in hours of chopping, dicing, slicing, and tenderizing. And without proper care, moisture and bacteria can build up within the pores of wood allowing for mold to grow. Eww!
It is essential to know how to clean a cutting board correctly.
You might be thinking youve got it covered by using a plastic cutting board. But, contrary to popular belief plastic cutting boards are not safer to use than wood. While they are less porous, you must take into account the knicks and cracks plastic cutting boards quickly occur with use. And the bacteria that grabs hold of these scars in the plastic.
Whereas wood and bamboo cutting boards dont scar as easily. And both are fairly easy to clean with simple ingredients you already have on hand, even if they arent friends with the dishwasher.
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How To Refinish A Wooden Cutting Board
After years of use, refinishing and oiling your cutting board will help smooth out any roughness or dullness.
Once you get to a point where your trusty wooden cutting board has been with you for years, it may require a little more elbow grease to stay in tip-top shape. If your board becomes worse for wear, Perez recommends sanding it down to refinish it.
To refinish a wooden cutting board, Perez uses a pencil to draw Xs all over both sides of the cutting board. Then, with a sheet of 200-grit sandpaper, he lightly sands the board with the grain until all of the pencil markings are gone and the surface is smooth. After that, he uses a sheet of superfine 500-grit sandpaper to go over the surfaces for finishing.
Once the wood has been sanded, its best to run it through the oiling process listed above to protect and condition the surface.
Refinishing A Badly Scarred Or Stained Board
After many years of use, your wood cutting board may become scarred, gouged, or stained with water spots on the surface. To smooth the surface and/or remove stubborn stains, it needs to be sanded.
Youll need to do several rounds of sanding, starting with a coarser-grit sandpaper and gradually working toward a finer-grit one. If your board has really deep gouges, you may want to start with 80-grit sandpaper and work your way up. Finishing with 220-grit sandpaper is probably sufficient in most cases, but theres no harm in continuing on to finer grits, like 320 or 400, if you feel so inclined. Cox said that finer-grit sandpaper creates smaller and smaller gouges into the board, which make it tougher and tougher for smaller particles to embed themselves into the board on a micro level.
Cut the sandpaper to fit around a small, flat box , a sanding block, or an electric orbital sander . Sand the board in the direction of the grain . Once the sandpaper becomes clogged or worn down, switch to a new piece.
Brush away any dust, and look at the board in the light, from a low angle. If you see any unevenness or inconsistencies, keep sanding with the same grit until the board looks even. Be sure to remove the boards deep gouges with the coarsest grit first, before moving on to finer grits.
Proceed in the same way for each subsequent grit. Cox recommends sanding both sides of your board so that each surface receives equal treatment and will be less prone to warping.
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