Cutting boards: Plastic vs. Wood (vs. wood fibre) --- which one is better?

Epicurean Exploits - Food and Recipes
1

Inspired by a quote from Gene K. in another thread:

I remember 25-30 years ago health departments said wooden cutting boards were unsafe and that we had to use plastic. I of course refused to use plastic. I thought something that can’t be cleaned cannot possibly be safe. Of course it turns out that wooden cutting boards are far safer than plastic. Because plastic is NOT porous yet can be scored by a knife it ends up harboring bacteria and dirt than can then contaminate food when working on that same board the next time

Didn’t want to thread-drift the other thread, and I thought there might be a lot to say on this topic, hence this separate thread.

Gene,
Can you expound on the “not porous” idea and how that makes plastic cutting boards more likely to harbor bacteria? I would have thought that the porous wood would harbor more bacteria than the non-porous plastic.

Also, does your opinion of plastic cutting boards change if said plastic cutting boards are cleaned in a dishwashwer? (I would think the dishwasher gets hot enough to sanitize them, no?)

Finally, how do you feel about the Epicurean wood fibre cutting boards? I have a couple, and like them.

2

http://fycs.ifas.ufl.edu/foodsafety/HTML/il114.htm

3

I think the issue with plastic is the surficial non-uniformity created through use on a microscopic scale, little nooks and crannies. But I would agree steam cleaning would solve that. Wood doesn’t deform like that, so less issue.

I really like my bamboo boards. Once a year, for no good reason, I will take my sander to them. Just like new.

4

Thanks for that link, Robert. Unless I missed it, that study doesn’t explicitly address washing plastic cutting boards with hot water and detergent and/or washing them in a dishwasher (unless I’m supposed to understand that the the following three sentences do address that topic):

Research has shown that when bacteria were inoculated on both wooden and polymer boards, bacterial recoveries from wooden boards generally were less than those from plastic boards, regardless of new or used status (Ak et al., 1994a). These authors found no differences between wood types (basswood, birch, maple, maple plus walnut). Cleaning with hot water and detergents was found to be effective in removing bacteria, regardless of the species, wood type, or whether the wood was new or used (Ak et al., 1994b).

That’s about as in-depth as the article gets, which isn’t as in-depth as I’d like. Not a big deal, really, as this topic is a mere curiosity for me. I’ve used plastic and wooden and wood fibre cutting boards, and have never had a contamination issue with any of them … yet.

5

I have stopped using the wood ones. I never liked the way they retained odors from the food cut on them. I have many different sizes of plastic ones and use them all the time.

6

Brian,

The problems with plastic is that the knife cuts the plastic. Here is one scenario: If you are breaking down chickens, bacteria can get into one of those cuts and then be sealed over by a subsequent cut that is made right next to that cut. Then when you subsequently use that same cutting board you are slicing and then reopen that channel that is harboring bacteria. Plastic, because it is not absorbent stays wet longer allowing bacteria to continue to grow.

Update: I just did some Googling and found the following which may be helpful:

10 Stubborn Food Myths That Just Won't Die, Debunked by Science (interesting read beyond the whole cutting board debate)

This article says that if you clean plastic properly (e.g. a bleach solution) it will be fine. A dishwasher might be a good substitute assuming you can fit it in the dishwasher.

@Merrill. You are not cleaning your boards very well if that is the case.

So based on what I have read, science has progressed (and my POV on this ) to say that both surfaces are fine and it becomes a matter of aesthetic . I will be sticking with wood: plastic is ugly. Wooden cutting boards have the advantage of being able to resurface them when they become worn. This is something I tried to do with plastic once about 20 years ago but could not.

7

I’ve used teak ones which wear well. I also have plastic ones that I keep segregated by food types. The plastic ones need replacing after a year or so of use. The wood ones need regular upkeep with oil.
I really don’t have a strong preference between the two.

8

I use plastic for my raw veggies, and wood for slicing my meat. I must have 5 different cutting boards…bamboo being my favorite serving board and always hand clean each board with hot water.

We pretty much eat off of cutting boards. Plates are sparse when it’s feedin’ time around here.

9

End grain maple block for me.

10

Don’t know - I do know that I have an ultra-sensitive sense of smell. I use the plastic ones and put them in the Miele dishwasher along with the rest of the dishes, and that removes the odors. A standard Miele cycle is about 2 hours of soap and hot water. No way I want or can spend that time with a wooden board [wow.gif] .

Another positive to the plastic is that they are much more light weight. I tend to take stuff into my living room and prep in there in front of the fire in the winter, or onto the porch in the summer. Just much easier than dragging around the big wooden board. I have 8 plastic boards of all sizes in rotation now. The wooden one has not been used for a couple of years, although it is sitting right there on the counter with the others.

Just me.

11

Thanks for your reply, Gene. That first link is quite interesting even beyond the topic of this thread. [cheers.gif]

12

I have one wood board dedicated for onions and garlic only, another for all other non-meat items, and a third for meats and fish.

13

I have some end-grain wood, and some Epicurean.

Knives dull faster on plastic and (to a lesser degree) bamboo. Or so say the real knife geeks (i’m only a semi-geek, having a mere 5 gyutos, and taking people’s word for it on things like this, rather than doing any sort of data gathering myself).

14

Always trust Cecil!

I use a plastic one for raw meats and have a couple of different size wood ones from everything else.

15

I use the NSF HDPE plastic and run through the dishwasher.

However, I almost never cut raw chicken on them. I buy chickens from a butcher that uses butcher paper. So I put the whole chickens on the butcher paper, usually in the sink. Using a boning knife, dismember said chicken which then goes into the brining or seasoning container, then the whole mess goes in the trash. Then a bleach cleanup spray. Very rarely do we eat pre-cut chicken. But if making something that requires a dice of raw chicken, the board goes straight to the dishwasher. Bleach, detergent, extremely hot water,steam sterilization and the drying cycle should (and does) take care of any nasty critters. If it will get Ancho Chili or Chipotles in Adobo stains out, I am convinced no bugs will survive.

Without meaning to offend anyone, if you need a cutting board to dismember or debone a chicken you need a few lessons. My knife never makes contact with any surfaces, except maybe the tip when I make the initial punch through the keel bone. But I usually position that over the disposal hole just in case.

16

I am offended.

17

+1 Let’s call Jaques Pepin and every other chef has used a cutting board (e.g. all of them) and tell them they need a few lessons…

18

We use mostly wood carving boards for meat and plastic ones for vegetables. We clean our plastic ones in the dishwasher.

19

Figured as much, but watch their technique carefully and you will find they almost never cut against the board. When dicing/chunking of course. But just dismembering almost never. Watch Jacques here Jacques Pépin on How to Cut Up a Chicken | Saveur, dismembers a chicken, knife never touches the board. So if he had done it on butcher paper ON TOP of a cutting board, or a counter or a truck tailgate it wouldn’t have mattered what material the board was made of. Which was of course my point.

20

Hate to disagree over nitpicky details, but if you open up Pepin’s La Technique/Methode (or the reprint Complete Techniques) you’ll see that he makes contact with the board when cutting through bone for cutting off the wing and wingtip, drumstick tips, and if he wanted to cut through the backbone.

I do agree with you in general, that one doesn’t “need” to contact the board when doing chicken prep, with butcher paper being one of the methods.