Creative Cutting Board Ideas for Kitchen! Essentials for Butcher's Block

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Cutting board, Butcher block and chopping board refer to the same cutting surface made of walnut, oak, maple, plastic and non-slip material. A great cutting board is essential for kitchen, it can be used for chopping meat, slicing chicken, beef, chopping off vegetables and making wedges of fruits for cocktails and juice.

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Wood Cutting Board a Precious Asset

There are tons of uses of a wooden cutting board for kitchen, it is also used as a wooden tray for serving coffee, tea, cheese, and cheese. The uses of a butcher’s block varies from one user to another, sometimes a set of three boards make are bought together for kitchen countertops where each wooden surface is used for a specific purpose.
It does not matter what you use your cutting board for, it has to be taken care of . Consider your Butcher’s block set as an asset, it has to be maintained very well for keeping it in good shape for years of use.

Styles and Materials of Butcher’s block for Kitchen

There are so many styles available in a wood cutting board such as edge grain, end grain, engraved, and a board with meat spikes. The most styles is the one that comes with additional juice catcher, grooves and a nice tray/drainer.
The material used in the design of butcher cutting board would determine its life and durability. Never go for cheap board because it might not have the quality cutting surface, besides it may also cross contaminate your food, fruits and vegetables or anything that you would put on it. Therefore, when you go for shopping for a butcher board, make sure it has either end-grain pattern or edge grain pattern.
Here are some of the common materials a cutting board surface is made of.
Wood, oak, walnut and maple wood.
Bamboo
Plastic and PVC
Easily Available patterns are end-grain and edge grain. Both are good for the cutting surface.
3D Wooden chopping board with Geometrical design
Butcher block with logo, names, and customized art
3D cutting board with mandalas, straight lines, Chevron and zigzag patterns

High Quality Wooden Cutting Board

The quality of any Butcher block board depends on the thickness of the wood used for the design. The most beautiful board is one that has deep purple texture, the basic material used for it might be walnut wood or maple wood. Walnut has more of the dark texture than the maple one.

If you are to buy a wooden chopping board for mother’s day gift or as a wedding or anniversary gift, go for the one that has antimicrobial surface. An antimicrobial cutting board is safer than the conventional ones because of antibacterial properties, which means that the food reside would not trap within the grain to contaminate the surface with harmful bacterial. It also means that your board is safe for dish washing, you can use a liquid dish washer with warm water on it to remove dirt and food. Wood cutting board finishing can be done by using a good quality oil to seal the grains, never use vegetable oil or cooking oil on the surface of the wood, it might damage the board. Instead only use high quality mineral oil for seasoning the wood surface of your cutting board to maintain its beauty and quality.

Another common feature of the cutting board could be small grooves within the design, these grooves are for catching liquid and juice, they are also called juice catchers. The most common material used in the design of all butcher blocks’ design is formaldehyde, however, some great maple and wood boards might not contain it.

A cutting board with knife holder or storage handle could be a good addition, you may be able to keep your knife within the board when you store the board. The storage handle would be helpful in storing or hanging the chopping board safely over the hook or stand.

Butcher Cutting Board Kitchen Gift Set

Just in case you are looking to buy a cutting board gift set for wedding or anniversary, go for the wooden ones that have engraving and artwork on them. You can even have the name of the bride or groom engraved on the cutting board gift set just to make it more welcoming and inviting. A butcher block with photo can also be considered, however, this kind of art is done on demand, you may have to pay extra in order for your wooden cutting board to be fully customized with the design you want.
Customized butcher cutting boards are good gifts for Christmas, Birthdays, special days and wedding days as well. Go for 3d Art on the wood surface, it would just look amazing for the day. For example, for Mother’s day, you can have the name of your mother engraved on the chopping board to make it a kind of a personalized wooden gift.

Wooden Cutting Board VS Plastic Cutting Board

When you go out for a chopping board shopping the common thought crosses your mind is which one would be better for your kitchen? There are so many advantages and disadvantages of both types of the boards, to be honestly, here are basic comparisons between wooden and plastic cutting boards.

Plastic chopping board does not come with a non-slip surface, which means you do not have proper control over the cutting surface as you chop and cut vegetables, bread, meat or fruits on it. On the contrary, wooden butcher cutting boards have a very firm, hard cutting surface to support you with fine cutting. You can work faster on non-slip wood surface as it can adapt to all cutting and chopping styles. For example, I can make potato julienne faster on it than I can on a slippery plastic surface. However, there are colorful non-slip board mats that can be used for keeping the surface of any board safe from scratches, marks and stains.
Plastic butcher’s blocks do not have end grains, if you chop garlic and onion on the surface , nasty food odor may trap within the plastic forever and it would not be easy to clean and wash. It is simply because plastic surface is usually non porous. Whereas Wooden( Maple, Oak, bamboo, cedar, walnut and all sorts of wood) are easy to clean and disinfect. A board with end grains have natural healing properties, you just need to use some salt with water or a few drops of vinegar in order to disinfect the surface of your cutting board.
Plastic chopping boards do not last longer if you do rigid chopping and cutting over the plastic surface the knife marks leave deep scars on them. On the contrary, wood butcher’s blocks have grains that keep them from getting scarred and stained during the cutting process.