Kitchen Cutting Boards: Advantages Of Different Materials
Most households keep one or more portable surfaces on which to slice and cut raw foods in preparation for cooking
. Kitchen cutting boards may be made of wood, plastic, glass, marble, or steel. Thickness distinguishes a cutting board from a chopping block. A cutting board typically measures one to two inches in height, while blocks are more often two to three inches.
Wood is the oldest, most traditional material for cutting boards. Hardwoods such as maple, cherry, oak, walnut, ash, and acacia are preferable because theyre less porous and more resistant to knife cuts, into which bacteria can grow and pose a health hazard. Maple is the most popular because it is the hardest. Boards are also available in rubberwood and teak.
Owners of wooden cutting boards should care for them to avoid both wear and buildup of bacteria. Ideally, a wooden cutting board should be cleaned with a mixture of vinegar and water after every use. The conscientious cook will also oil a wooden board with a food-grade mineral oil on a regular basis to keep it from drying out and cracking.
Plastic kitchen cutting boards are cheap, light, and dishwasher friendly. Owners may disinfect them with a 20-to-1 diluted mix of water and bleach. Makers of plastic boards produce them in an array of colors. To avoid cross contamination, a cook may color code them for use, using green for vegetables and fruits, yellow for seafood and poultry, and pink or red for meats.
An added appeal of plastic boards is that they can be bent in order to pour cut and chopped foods into boiling pots or mixing bowls without spilling anything. Hikers and campers like them for preparing food in the wild because plastic boards are so light and flexible.
In the late twentieth century, bamboo became an increasingly favored material for kitchen cutting boards. Bamboo is 16 percent harder than maple wood, has natural anti-microbial qualities, and is ecologically responsible. A grass rather than a wood, bamboo grows much faster: a 60-foot stand returns in three to five years, from the same deep roots and stalks as an earlier harvest. Hardwood forests have to be replanted, and take decades to reach the stage when they can be cut again. There are many species of bamboo as well. Moso Bamboo, for example, has been identified as not being a food source for the endangered Giant Panda bear.
The other materials used for kitchen cutting boards all tend to wear out knives much faster. Glass is very hard on cutting knives; it can dull or even chip them. In addition, a glass board is more slippery than wood, so a chef runs a greater risk of an unpleasant encounter between knife and fingers. Though the easiest to clean, steel is the hardest on knives. Marble looks impressive, but also dulls knives. It also slowly dissolves from repeated applications of tomato juice and vinegar. Marble, steel, and glass are recommended primarily for rolling bread dough, building sandwiches, or serving cheeses and displaying other foods.
In recent years, kitchen cutting boards have featured retractable handles for carrying prepared foods. Typically rectangular in shape, many cutting boards include a reservoir, sometimes referred to as a juice canal, along the edges to catch excess liquids.
by: talan0946
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