# wood cutting boards in a commercial kitchen



## skewed

I feel a little ashamed to be asking this because I have worked in commercial kitchens for a number of years: are there any laws forbidding me from using a wood cutting board at work? I am sure this varies from state to state. I did some googling but haven't been able to find any definitive answers. After a report in 1994 the industry started to move away from wood boards. I have been told a number of times that wood boards were banned here in Oregon. I can not find any solid evidence that is true. To complicate this matter, I work in a kitchen that is not regulated by the county I live in but rather the state (or more specifically- quasi-self regulated which is a bunch of bs- but another topic altogether).

I am really tired of using the provided poly boards. They suck! I am very willing to pack a wood board into work as long as it doesn't go against any laws. I highly doubt that anyone would say a word about me doing it.

Cheers,
rj


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## kielasaurus

They might say something because people hate change and things that are different. I would recommend getting yourself a Hi-Soft or other rubber type board that is more forgiving on your knives and is able to be sanitized in a way that the state deems appropriate.


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## LifeByA1000Cuts

Epicurean-style boards, maybe (dishwasher safe wood fibre boards)? I guess that they are loud as a snare drum, especially with the feet on, won't matter in a busy commercial kitchen


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## Ivang

I work in California and use a wooden board for produce prep at work. I don't know if it's against the law, but nobody has said anything to me yet. I keep it clean and sanitized and it goes away after I'm done with that part of my day everyday.


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## Danzo

We use only plastic style at both my kitchens. Not sure if it's illegal or not. But if there's any state that would allow it I think Oregon is it. You guys don't have glove laws over there, which is awesome. Not that I wear them anyway because I keep my hands clean and gloves mess with my cutting. But it still sucks that those are the rules here in WA


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## daveb

+1 on hi-soft. Inch for inch it's much lighter than wood, kind to knives, easy to sanitize and keeps everybody happy. Amazon has them just north of $100.


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## S-Line

Wood cutting board isn't technically banned here in the state of Georgia, but we've had difficulty during our health inspections depending on the health inspector. And if you do decide to use a wood cutting board at work, I would recommend that you get several so you can have different ones for meats/veggie etc.

IMO for a commercial kitchen, I would recommend hi-soft just like others have stated. Or if you can find a retailer who sells hasagawa soft cutting boards, I actually liked those better than hi-soft.


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## skewed

Thanks for the responses. I think I will just give it a go. I have extra boards at home (an old line board that I planed flat and chopped in half- was ~5'x15"). If I get any grief I will probably lay down the cash for a Hi-Soft.

Speaking of Hi-Soft, are there any fairly common brick and mortar stores that carry them?

Cheers,
rj


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## kielasaurus

Not that I've seen, unless you're near Korin (if they still carry them).


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## ecchef

I'm governed by the (Federal) Tri-Service Food Code which states:

4-101.17 Wood, use limitation
(A) Except as specified in ¶¶ (B), (C), and (D) of this section, wood and wood wicker may
not be used as a FOOD-CONTACT SURFACE.
(B) Hard maple or an equivalently hard, close-grained wood may be used for:
(1) Cutting boards, cutting blocks, bakers tables, and UTENSILS such as rolling pins,
doughnut dowels, salad bowls, sushi bamboo rolls, chopsticks; and
(2) Wooden paddles used in confectionery operations for pressure scraping kettles when
manually preparing confections at a temperature of 230oF (110oC) or above.

Not sure how closely individual States follow this model.


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## skewed

ecchef- our state code is probably similar to the one you stated. I am still digging around to find out for sure.

First day with my maple edge grain board at work today. So darn nice to use a wood board at work! It is a bit under sized and edge grain but still a whole lot better than ploy! I might look around for a larger low cost end grain board to replace this one for work.


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## aaamax

Plastic for your knife is about as fun as putting a rubber on your
Only once have I been questioned about my wood cutting boards during a health run. Just had to assure that they were being kept clean and not mixing veg/proteins etc. In honesty, take a swab of any surface at your station and you'll find all manner of nasties, no matter how well one cleans. Not saying hygiene isn't important, IT'S VERY important, but the whole plastic vs wood in regards to this question, well, the health dept. should worry about other things.
As you can probably tell, I hate plastic and all its ilk. There is nothing like a nice soft-wood, yes, you read right, soft wood, as in pine, cutting board. Forces you to have a light touch as well so you improve your technique.
Try it sometime with your favorite blade and damn if there is any going back to regular boards.
Cheers.


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## paulraphael

ecchef said:


> I'm governed by the (Federal) Tri-Service Food Code which states:
> 
> 4-101.17 Wood, use limitation
> (A) Except as specified in ¶¶ (B), (C), and (D) of this section, wood and wood wicker may
> not be used as a FOOD-CONTACT SURFACE.
> (B) Hard maple or an equivalently hard, close-grained wood may be used for:
> (1) Cutting boards, cutting blocks, bakers tables, and UTENSILS such as rolling pins,
> doughnut dowels, salad bowls, sushi bamboo rolls, chopsticks; and
> (2) Wooden paddles used in confectionery operations for pressure scraping kettles when
> manually preparing confections at a temperature of 230oF (110oC) or above.
> 
> Not sure how closely individual States follow this model.



I can't remember the exact statute, but pretty sure it's similar in NYC. You see wood used more often in butcher shops, and pizza places use wooden peels. Some sushi places use hinoki wood, others use sanituff. The few high end kitchens I've been in or staged in used plastic. Unceremoniously. Like, a big sanitizer-filled bin for clean boards, and another bin to toss used boards into. 

I dislike cutting on plastic, but the way I cut now there's so little board contact that I can get used to it. 

At home I really like my big maple Boardsmith board, but sometimes use my girlfriend's poly boards just for convenience. There's something comforting about beater tools. One less thing to think about.


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## DaveInMesa

Usually the argument against wood is that it's porous, and therefore impossible to sanitize. This is proof that a little knowledge is dangerous. 

Wood IS porous. It's also part of a formerly living thing that needed to defend itself against infection, and the bark was not it's only defence mechanism. When poly boards fist came along, they were far worse than wooden boards in terms of sanitization. The micro-grooves caused by normal use provided excellent hiding places for bacteria, which grew and thrived much better than the same bacteria on wood. So, now all poly boards have built-in anti-bacterial agents. How did they figure out how to do this? _*They copied what wood was already doing!*_ 

All of the woods used to produce cutting boards have natural anti-bacterial properties. Some more than others. Hinoki and other soft woods are actually much better in this regard, as well as better for your knives. No, you can't run them through the dishwasher, but you don't need to. 

So, the answer to your question depends more on your inspector than it does on your local regulations. Some inspectors know the score; many do not. If you've got a good one, they won't hassle you about it, regardless of what the rules say.


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## cschoedler

I use an Asahi board from Korin at work and at home and I love it. I also have a pretty nice end grain boos butcher block at the house but usually work with the Asahi on top to make clean up easier. 

One thing I've always wondered about was using a wooden Hangiri at work to mix rice. Only one of my inspectors has even noticed it. He said as long as it was in good shape(not falling apart/clean) he was good with it. He told us the only thing he really stressed in a Sushi bar other than general cleanliness was the PH of rice, fish temps in coolers/showcases, and gloves.


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## paulraphael

DaveInMesa said:


> It's also part of a formerly living thing that needed to defend itself against infection, and the bark was not it's only defence mechanism.



I've read this explanation before. I've also read the half-dozen or so peer-reviewed studies on the safety of wood boards vs. plastic ones. In terms of the broad strokesthat wood boards are safeyou're right. But there's no basis or the bacteriolocidal story. Wood cutting boards don't kill pathogens.

The real story is more mundane; the pores are small, and any pathogens that find their way into them are held safely away from the food, where they eventually die of their own accord. The surface of the wood, which the food contacts, can be washed and sanitized, and sanded when it gets carved up. The only real downside to wood is that you can't throw it in a dishwasher.

The recommendation in the the Health Dept. statute cited above is that hard, closed-grain woods be used. This is important; open-grain woods like oak could harbor bacteria in places that are both exposed to food and hard to clean. They behave like a board (wood or plastic) that's full of knife grooves.


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## LifeByA1000Cuts

"Wood cutting boards don't kill pathogens." depends on size of pathogen and how hard you hit it


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## BorkWoodNC

Here is a study that is often sited regarding the wood vs plastic debate: http://faculty.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/faculty/docliver/Research/cuttingboard.htm

I always leave it up to the individual to make their own decision and check their local regs.

I know several restaurants that use my wood serving trays, some local regs allow this but I've been told it is questionable in some places.


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## DaveInMesa

paulraphael said:


> I've read this explanation before. I've also read the half-dozen or so peer-reviewed studies on the safety of wood boards vs. plastic ones.



Being peer-reviewed, unfortunately, no longer means anything. There are enough desperate pseudo-scientists out there willing to agree to anything in return for the guarantee of an equally favorable review on their own papers. These days, it's necessary to know the source and the source of the funding of any published research. 

However, some things are well-established facts. All woods are composed primarily of cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin. Lignin is made up of mostly coniferyl alcohol and, in hardwoods, sinapyl alcohol. Any form of alcohol is an effective antimicrobial. Coniferyl alcohol, being abundantly available, is used as the basis of a number of effective insecticides, as well. That would indicate substantially more killing power than is needed to eliminate most bacteria.

One of the few studies to examine this question that _wasn't_ funded by the oil industry, directly or indirectly, was the one by the U.C Davis Food Safety Laboratory, which concluded that "disease bacteria such as these (Salmonella and e. Coli) were not recoverable from wooden surfaces in a short time after they were applied, unless very large numbers (of bacteria) were used." In other words, something was killing them without human intervention. 

It went on further to state that "New plastic surfaces allowed the bacteria to persist, but were easily cleaned and disinfected. However, wooden boards that had been used and had many knife cuts acted _almost the same as new wood_, whereas _plastic surfaces that were knife-scarred were impossible to clean and disinfect_".

In addition, although state and local health regulations may impose stricter guidelines than the Federal standards (so, don't assume the Federal standards will protect you, entirely), "the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Meat and Poultry Inspection Manual (official regulations) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's 1999 Food Code (recommended regulations for restaurants and retail food sales in the various states of the U.S.) _permit use of cutting boards made of maple or similar close-grained hardwood_. They do *not *specifically authorize acceptable plastic materials, nor do they specify how plastic surfaces must be maintained."

A separate study (Kass, P.H., et al., Disease determinants of sporadic salmonellosis in four northern California counties: a case control study of older children and adults. Ann. Epidemiol. 2:683-696, 1992.), found that "those (home cooks) using wooden cutting boards in their home kitchens were less than *half *as likely as average to contract salmonellosis, those using synthetic (plastic or glass) cutting boards were about *twice *as likely as average to contract salmonellosis; and the effect of cleaning the board regularly after preparing meat on it was not statistically significant". 

You can read the rest here, if you like. Emphasis added above, to make it easier to read.

I should probably mention that I use both wood and plastic. I'm not anti-plastic, just pro-facts.


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## DaveInMesa

BorkWoodNC said:


> Here is a study that is often sited regarding the wood vs plastic debate: http://faculty.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/faculty/docliver/Research/cuttingboard.htm



Hah! We both referenced the same study. :doublethumbsup:


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## paulraphael

DaveInMesa said:


> Being peer-reviewed, unfortunately, no longer means anything.



Uh ... you could say that being peer-reviewed doesn't mean everything, but certainly means something. Anyway, you're citing studies that are peer-reviewed, that I've read, that I think are perfectly reasonable.

The only point I disputed is that wood cutting boards have active bacteriocidal properties. I've never seen a study that demonstrated this. I did not say this to suggest that wood boards aren't safe. The science says they're perfectly safe, when used properly, but for reasons unrelated to that hypothesis. Like you, I use both. I prefer wood.

Not all the studies I've read agree with one another, but the general consensus is that both wood and plastic are safe, if properly maintained and properly cleaned. Proper cleaning and maintenance is a bit different for each, so we need to know what we're doing.

The Kass study you cite finds that a knife-scarred wood board harbors less recoverable bacteria than a knife-scarred plastic board. Which is to say, wood seems to be more tolerant of poor maintenance. But in any case, it's safest with either kind of board to maintain the thing properly ... which in most cases with poly boards means replacing them often. Unless someone's finally found a reasonable way to sand the things.


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## LifeByA1000Cuts

It might not mean much about the verity of the content, but it means a lot of the effect a study has on public opinion. And that is what counts, no?


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## paulraphael

I think spreading the idea that wood kills germs is deceptive and dangerous. The really message is that wood and plastic are both safe, provided you do x, y, and z.


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## skewed

So here is a bit of an update: I am two months into this experiment. Edge retention has more than doubled. I should not be surprised but seriously... doubled at least. I am now really considering getting a Hi-soft or similar board for work. Moving to a high quality synthetic would save me any possible grief from higher-ups about the use of wood yet hopefully still provide the benefits of using a forgiving surface. The board I have kept at work is quite small so my small collection of 270 knives have been unused recently since I have been favoring my smaller 240's and 210's. Anyone know of good deals on a hi quality synthetic board that is commercial kitchen sized? I am thinking 40cm x 70cm+.

I still feel a little weird/snobby(?) about providing and hefting around my own board but ditching poly is clearly a good thing.


Cheers,
rj


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## toufas

Do they make them colour coded?
I have some nice tamarind wood blocks that I can't use and I really can't stand the standard plastic ones but they have to be colour coded


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## BorkWoodNC

All else equal, wood boards certainly look better than any plastic I've seen.....(I may be a little biased but don't think many would disagree)


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## DaveInMesa

paulraphael said:


> Uh ... you could say that being peer-reviewed doesn't mean everything, but certainly means something.



I believe I said it doesn't mean _anything_, rather than everything, but okay. I guess it _does_ mean _something._ It means that whoever wrote the article made the effort to get someone to at least say they reviewed it, and then made the effort to submit to enough journals to get it published. That's *all* it means, these days. 

I've seen proof that anyone with enough time to waste can write the most idiotic pseudo-scientific drivel imaginable, get it reviewed by any number of "review whores", and get it published in a supposedly reputable peer-reviewed journal. I've seen it done, intentionally, to prove the point. That science has come to this is tragic, in my view, but it's a fact.

That's why it's important to know the source and the motivation behind any scientific reports, these days. 90% of it is funded by industries that expect, and get, results that paint their products/efforts in the best possible light, and that makes it unreliable, reviewed or not. There are exceptions, such as when a school with no axe to grind tackles a subject, such as cutting boards, in an unbiased manner for the sake of pure science. But that's why it's important to know the source, and to have good BS-detecting skills which, as the recent election proved, are sorely lacking in this country at this time.


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## LifeByA1000Cuts

My half-cynical comment was about peer review meaning something about the effectiveness of using that study in getting your way


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## spoiledbroth

Are Sani tuff like the thicker more square commercial cutting boards? They seem softer than the standard commercial hard plastic evetyone hates? Those are decent too, approaching hisoft imo.


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## DaveInMesa

paulraphael said:


> I think spreading the idea that wood kills germs is deceptive and dangerous.



You can think anything you like, but do you have any basis for that opinion, or is it simply that you don't like it and that's that?

I assume you have no background in science or analysis, since you (like many others) seem to have completely overlooked or failed to understand the facts stated. But, let's hear your theory to explain why, after smearing equal amounts of bacteria on new wooden and plastic boards, the bacteria on the wooden boards died and the ones on the plastic boards did not, bearing in mind that the researchers did _nothing_ to account for that difference.


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## DaveInMesa

LifeByA1000Cuts said:


> My half-cynical comment was about peer review meaning something about the effectiveness of using that study in getting your way



Yeah. It seems to be the gilding on the turd, now.... "OOH! Shiny thing!"


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## paulraphael

DaveInMesa said:


> You can think anything you like, but do you have any basis for that opinion, or is it simply that you don't like it and that's that?
> 
> I assume you have no background in science or analysis, since you (like many others) seem to have completely overlooked or failed to understand the facts stated. But, let's hear your theory to explain why, after smearing equal amounts of bacteria on new wooden and plastic boards, the bacteria on the wooden boards died and the ones on the plastic boards did not, bearing in mind that the researchers did _nothing_ to account for that difference.



My opinion is based on looking at a lot of studies, including the ones you've cited. And it's about seeing the way that people who don't have a good science background can hear an idea and run with it to unreasonable conclusions. I know _you_ know how to clean and sanitize a cutting board, so I don't think the distinction matters that much to you specifically. I make the distinction for people who read these forums and are more prone to getting the wrong idea.

Regarding the science, there is no support (that I've seen) for wood acting as a bacteriacide. The studies that examined the issue conclude that wood (if it's a closed-grain variety) sequesters bacteria away from the food until they eventually die on their own. The wood does not kill bacteria that's sitting on the surface. No cutting board does that. I don't want people to get the idea that wood has magical bacteria-killing properties.

As far as the general safety of wood boards, you and I seem to be in complete agreement. I'm just talking about how to responsibly communicate it to other people in a public forum.


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