When I posted the butternut squash soup with cinnamon sugar crouton recipe I wanted to try after a friend of ours made herself a pot back on Captiva Island, I mentioned in one of the photo captions that our cutting board was on the verge of giving up the ghost after years of faithful service. Aaron and I had been looking for the perfect replacement for about twelve months but had run into difficultly getting what we wanted – a high quality, edge-grain, 36″ x 24″ darker-stained board that was at least 1.25″ to 2.0″ thick. A custom cutting board of that size would allow both of us to be productive as we divided the work for bigger family dinners; would make it easier for me to sort out the large quantities of granny smith apples I need for my homemade pies, pre-sort out ingredients so we can just go down the list and use them as necessary on the nearby stove. The utility gain would be tremendous.
[mainbodyad]At the suggestion of James Kraus (thank you, thank you, thank you!) who was not only kind enough to provide us with a recommendation based upon his own search for a custom cutting board, but later posted pictures of the finished product he had received, we contacted Dan out in San Diego, who runs a business called Custom Cutting Boards. He lets you specify your design parameters, wood type, and even small details like whether you want rubber feet on the underside. Half-a-dozen emails and barely a week later, it was done. The cutting board arrived this morning and we’ve been seasoning it with mineral oil. By tomorrow, we should have both sides fully treated so it will be ready to enter service.
We ended up going with a walnut cutting board, 1.25 inches thick, 36 inches by 24 inches. We seriously considered 2.00 inches thick but at this size, I’m so glad we didn’t do it because it would have been difficult, if not impossible, for most people to lift without the risk of dropping it. The speed with which it was done was awesome and the price wasn’t bad, either. Delivered, it came to $412, of which $360 was the custom cutting board itself and $52 was shipping.
Here’s a closeup of the mineral oil soaking into the custom cutting board. If we’re going to treat this thing once a week like the materials included in the package recommend, I need to find a decent bulk supplier of the food-safe kind.
Our original cutting board had been a housewarming gift from two of our best friends and was the work surface we used as we learned to cook. It had been beaten, pounded, burnt, scalded, cut, scraped, and scrubbed so many times it was a miracle it was still intact, especially since we had no idea how to care for it when we started cooking several years ago. (It was one of those situational knowledge things – nobody ever sat us down in childhood and said, “This is a nice, wooden cutting board. You cannot submerge it in water. You must regularly season it with mineral oil. Never run water directly over it.”, and all the other rules that seem like common sense now, such as scrubbing it with a mixture of salt and lime juice if it becomes stained with something that won’t come out of the wood.)
You’ve seen us use that cutting board to make everything from desserts such as the caramel pecan apple pie and nectarine white chocolate cream pie to Italian food like stuffed ravioli in a tomato and cream sauce and spinach fettuccine with butter and Parmesan cheese; tomato sauce with onion and butter; Japanese Gyoza with spicy sauce; banana walnut birthday cake with cream cheese icing; beef bulgogi; Saag Paneer with homemade Indian cheese; nights we stayed up testing dessert recipes; improving canned beef stock; winter dinner at home playing Dragon Age: Inquisition. You saw us use it in our spicy white chicken chili recipe and our Wendy’s replica red chili recipe. Even when it wasn’t in the picture, it was used for Korean spicy pork stir fry, our first Bibimbap, the most delicious corn chowder recipe you’ll ever find.
[mainbodyad]That cutting board was the most used item in our kitchen, with the exception of the Technivorm Moccamaster. (Public service announcement: The Technivorm Moccamaster is a device so perfect it will single-handedly make you love The Netherlands for engineering a coffee pot that hasn’t had any need for an update in more than half a century. If you enjoy coffee but don’t own one, just spend the $300 and be done with it. Read the reviews for yourself if you must. It deserves every word of praise. Every single cup is perfect. I recommend it without reservation . It’s fantastic. There is no planned obsolescence here. It’s an appliance from a completely different time.)
I have a lot of work to get done but I think I might go play Final Fantasy Type-O for awhile. It’s almost like the old Final Fantasy series, Golden Eye on Nintendo 64, and Mortal Kombat had a baby. As with Skyrim, et. al., I naturally gravitate toward being a ranged player – King with his double pistols, Trey with his bow, and Ace with his cards are my favorite, but I’m also kind of digging how Seven uses her whip and Queen … that lady is just powerful. In the middle of melee battle, executing divine judgment then going in for a kill shot has this overwhelming sense of satisfaction when battling the military. I understand one of the other characters remarking in passing, “… I hope she never turns on us.”
Reader Comments (21)
Comments are presented chronologically, with replies indented beneath the comments to which they respond.
James Kraus
April 1, 2015
Looks great! I am glad it worked out. In addition to mineral oil, you might want to look into Boos Board Cream (available from Amazon); a mixture of mineral oil and beeswax. It seems to last a bit longer than mineral oil alone. I apply the oil first, and add the cream a day or so later. Another trick is to heat your mineral oil in pan of hot tap water to thin it out; allowing it to penetrate deeper into the wood pores.
Joshua Kennon
April 1, 2015
Replying to James Kraus
Oh man, I just checked out the review for the Boos Board Cream. People act like it's some sort of miracle product. I'm going to have to give it a try. Thanks for the tip!
I hadn't seen your cookbook but flipping through it, I have a question: Between it and the kitchen design you shared in the other comment thread, I'm curious: Why the 1960's? Is it the aesthetic in general? Were you alive then and it makes you nostalgic? How did that happen? It seems like a really interesting thing.
James Kraus
April 1, 2015
Replying to Joshua Kennon
All the above. I was alive then; though still in my teens when the decade ended. My enthusiasm for the sixties really encompasses only the brief period of time from 1960 to round mid-1967. The late sixties were entirely different - really a prelude to the seventies with the ascendancy of earth-tone clothing and appliances, long sideburns, bell-bottom trousers and other aesthetic horrors. To me the early-to-mid sixties era was a high point of fashion, design, and many other disciplines.
Even many of today's food trends can be traced back to the opening of Manhattan's The Four Seasons restaurant at the dawn of the decade. They were the first serious U.S. temple of cuisine to stress seasonal ingredients, locally-sourced produce and domestic wines.
Anon
April 1, 2015
Replying to James Kraus
... *cough, cough* send Joshua a free copy *cough, cough* ...
ValueisWhatYouGet
April 5, 2015
Replying to Joshua Kennon
I'll second the recommendation for the Boos Board Cream. I'm a pretty heavy cooker and use my Boos cutting board multiple times a day so it gets used rather often. About once or twice a week I'll slather it up with some of the Boos Board Cream and it's soft and supple the next day.
There are also mineral wipes which are decent, but the cream is many times better. Just my $.02 though
thegoblinchief
April 1, 2015
Neat board. Way out of my price range but I can appreciate the craftsmanship of it. Hope it serves you well 🙂
My brother has a MoccaMaster. Eh. It's fine. Nothing about it, other than the reputation of bulletproof reliability, particularly wowed me. I had to give up coffee recently for health reasons, but I was a fan of the AeroPress myself before that. Fantastic little device less than 1/10 the price.
Eric
April 2, 2015
Replying to thegoblinchief
I've used an AeroPress every day for about 3 years. The quality of an AeroPress isn't amazing, because the coffee passes through a paper filter that takes out all the good oils and stuff. But it's nice because it makes a single cup more efficiently than a big machine with better taste than k-cups.
thegoblinchief
April 2, 2015
Replying to Eric
They make a fine metal mesh filter as well. I was fine with the paper filters, but if that's an issue, check it out. I think it's about another $15.
Eric
April 2, 2015
Replying to thegoblinchief
Good call! I just ordered one on Amazon for under $10. Thanks for the heads up on that.
Steve
April 2, 2015
Replying to Eric
I also have been using the Aeropress for awhile now and enjoy it for making the occasional cup at work. The only thing that bugs me about is though is that the consistency seems to vary wildly. I don't know if it's because I'm not using the precise water temp everytime or if the grinds are consistently the same, but my experience has been that sometimes I will get the best damn cup of coffee I've ever drank or it will just be meh. I wonder if it has something to do with biology though, something something tastebuds and smells changing and varying day to day?
Chris
April 2, 2015
At the risk of being pedantic, that cutting board is edge grain not end grain.
Adam Yates
April 2, 2015
That is absolutely gorgeous. I got a Boos board along with the oil & cream for Christmas. Should I ever need another, I'll definitely keep this one in mind. And yes; I second the fact that the "mystery oil" and "board cream" are magic. 🙂 Thanks for the post!
joe pierson
April 2, 2015
Ashamed to cut into that, it's such a fine piece of furniture.
AC
April 2, 2015
Beautiful!
How does the mineral oil not get onto the foods you are cutting?
thegoblinchief
April 2, 2015
Replying to AC
the mineral oil soaks into the wood, waterproofing it. You're supposed to let the board rest a certain amount of time after seasoning, but that's also why you specifically get food grade mineral oil.
Jeff
April 3, 2015
Looks beautiful! Unfortunately, I would be hesitant to eat food prepared from it. I am very allergic to black walnut. I know as I used to work with it in my parents wood shop. I break out if I am exposed to black walnut dust. It is toxic enough that horse farms make sure to avoid getting sawdust for horse bedding from woodshops that process it. It *probably* wouldn't be a problem for me, but it might hurt someone else.
Joshua Kennon
April 3, 2015
Replying to Jeff
That's crazy; never heard of that. I wonder, is it a concern whenever you go eat somewhere given how popular walnut cutting boards have been in the past few years due to retailers like Williams-Sonoma making them one of their main lines? I'd imagine if maintained well and properly treated it wouldn't be a problem but you never know. I can't imagine that's pleasant.
On a happier note, if you order a custom cutting board from the guy we did, he shows the different woods he has available on his website. Right now, besides Walnut, you can also have one made in Bubinga, Cherry, Hickory/Pecan, Jatoba, African Mahogany, Hard Maple, Padauk, Purpleheart, White Oak, Lyptus, and Red Oak so there is bound to be something for everyone.
Karen
April 6, 2015
Great looking board. We just got a cheapie at Marshalls a while ago. It's getting abused and we wash it with soap and water. But how are you washing your board, and will you use plastic for meats?
Joshua Kennon
April 6, 2015
Replying to Karen
1. You can find a good picture guide to cleaning and maintaining a wooden cutting board here. The USDA itself confirms the suggestion of using a given ratio of unscented bleach-to-water if handling raw meat on the board. You can then restore the board's health using the food safe mineral oil.
2. Plastic cutting boards are the subject of the modern day equivalent of an old wive's tale. Plastic is not only not safer than wood when it comes to handling raw meat, some of the research indicates you are more likely to get food poisoning from it than you are the wood counterpart as the latter can absorb and neutralize the bacteria within a few minutes due to its natural properties. The idea that plastic is somehow safer has been entirely, completely, and totally debunked by the University of California's UC-Davis Food Safety Laboratory, run by Dr. Dean O. Cliver. The weird fact this myth keeps getting repeated caused Lifehacker to list it first on a post about 10 food myths that just won't die, linking to Dr. Cliver's findings. What makes it even weirder is that if you look at some older studies, there is a very decent probability that plastic cutting boards are, in fact, less safe and more likely to give you food poisoning. (It's kind of funny how, sometimes, the older technology is better. Look at brass doorknobs. There has been a push to go back to them despite the higher cost in recent years because it turns out they neutralize bacteria naturally by destroying the DNA, killing the germs.)
That said, we are pretty strict about food safety because that was one thing my mom was really worried about growing up. If there are foods that aren't going to be cooked, for example, those always get cut first before any raw meat has touched the board to avoid cross contamination. Even if the meat is the first ingredient in the pan, everything else gets made and prepped first in dump-in bowls like a television show prior to opening the meat package. Food thermometers are always on hand because we double check internal temperature even if we know the meat is done just to have a numerical confirmation. There are industry-quality plastic, disposable gloves from a discount superstore near us for really messy jobs (or dealing with cutting large quantities of things like peppers so the oils don't burn for days no matter how hard you try to scrub them out). If we even touch raw meat, we don't touch anything else until our hands have been washed. I'd be willing to bet that, God forbid, were we ever to suffer food poisoning, it would almost assuredly come from the same source most restaurants: The fruits and vegetables.
We've thought about ordering a separate butcher's block to match this cutting board, as well as, maybe, a new, giant maple pie board, but the first really isn't necessary. It would be more of a convenience thing.
Karen
April 7, 2015
Replying to Joshua Kennon
Thanks for the great info on boards. Inspired by your reply, our 6-year-old and I sanded and seasoned our board with mineral oil today and I rubbed some oil into the handles of our very old and used Chicago cutlery knife set. Fun stuff.
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April 25, 2015
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