WHAT CUTTING BOARDS DO I NEED?

A large & small end-grain board, and one large & one small no-skid plastic board

10 MINUTE READ

BY: DAVID OLKOVETSKY & THE ARTISAN REVERE WOOD TEAM

There are dozens of different cutting board styles, materials, and hundreds of minor differences between different boards. In this article we're going to cut through the marketing jargon as well as the fake and typically profoundly misinformed Amazon reviews, and tell you what the most useful cutting boards are, and which ones to avoid.

Before we dive into the cutting board styles, let's refresh on the 5 things ALL boards absolutely must have to be considered quality boards.

1. A cutting board should be gentle on your knife edges,

2. A cutting board should not slip and slide around your countertops,

3. A cutting board should be easy to lift and maneuver,

4. A cutting board should should not warp or bow or break, and,

5. A properly made end-grain cutting board should last a lifetime, and a well-made plastic cutting board should last for years.

In this edition, we’re talking about the best cutting boards, and looking at what matters and what doesn't. Here's the TLDR:

Gentle on knives, safe, built to last, non-slip, with a refined fit & finish.

Contents

What Cutting Boards Do I Need?

All good cutting boards have a few things in common. They should be: soft on knife edges, easy to move around. They should NOT: slip & slide on the countertops for safety, and not crumble, leak, or fall apart due to poor construction or materials. If the board is made well, it should last an extremely long time too. And, then, of course, for us at Artisan Revere: all boards should be comfortable. They should be useful, be a pleasure to use and make you happy.

This article dives into the top cutting board types you need in your kitchen. So let's cut to the chase and tell you what we think you'll need and why, based on your personal needs.

For the minimalists, who want the absolute bare minimum number of boards, you'll need 2. One large non-slip plastic cutting board for animal proteins, and one large end-grain cutting board for everything else.

For the optimizers, like me, you'll want 4+ boards. One (maybe two) large and one small non-slip plastic cutting boards, and one large and one small end-grain cutting board.

Now, let's discuss the details that make great wooden and plastic cutting boards, and cover many of the flaws that most cutting boards have. These include necessary or unnecessary juice grooves (some boards need them, others don't), poor skid resistance, bad material choices that hurt knife edges, rough edges, bad joinery, and more. We finish up by telling you the types of cutting boards you should never buy, unless you want to ruin your knives.

Just below, is a quick video showing a prototype Artisan Revere board in action. This one is made from Maple. Back in the early days, we didn't realize just how much better cherry and walnut were.

The Big End-Grain Cutting Board: Your Main Board

The Big End-Grain Board: This is your most used cutting board. It should live on your countertop standing on its side edge, and it should brighten your kitchen and your mood every time you see it. You're going to wind up using your big end-grain board for almost all of your meal prep and for all those longer cooking sessions. It's convenient, it's solid, it doesn't slide around on the countertops, and as long as you give it just a bit of TLC, it'll run like a Toyota. AKA forever. The Artisan Revere 18" x 12" board is built tough, while also being gentle on your knives. That's how all end-grain boards should be. And that's one of the keys. Even if you're using a crazy thin Japanese "laser" nakiri or gyuto, that knife should not feel like your edge is breaking every time it touches the board. That's how my ultra-thin lasers feel when I cut on literally every single plastic board I've tested. I'm not a Japanese sushi chef: I rock chop and push cut. I'm not doing 100% gentle slices. Lasers will get wrecked by plastic boards. Not so with end-grain wood because of the capillary structure of the wood. We wrote a very detailed report discussing what makes a good end-grain board, which you can read here: What Makes The Best End-Grain Cutting Boards. To summarize for those limited by time: 1. better wood selection, 2. the quality of the wood joinery, 3. 4. the right glue, 5. soft beveling of the edges & corners, 6. thorough finishing with the right sanding and oiling, and 7. rubber feet. If any of those is off, your end-grain board won't last multiple lifetimes.

📝 Personal Experience: I can't tell you how many times in the past few months I've stayed at AirBnBs or at friends homes and seen some pretty cheap cutting boards paired up with fancy knives. I've seen those Amazon-favorite Teak boards which dull your knives incredibly fast due to the high silica content. I am dumbfounded that they're as highly rated as they are. I've seen Epicurean boards, which are even worse on your edges. I've seen face-grain bamboo boards that are literally broken in half and folded over. And by the way, bamboo kills your edges too because it too has loads of silica! I've seen face-grain wooden boards that have massive gaps between the pieces of wood and/or are bent or warped. And finally, I've seen a ~$120 end-grain walnut board that totally cratered because the wood selection (tiny pieces of walnut) and joinery were atrocious. And, to be blunt (bad pun intended), your cheap board is dulling your knife much faster than a quality board will. I explain this in detail in The Definitive Guide To Cutting Boards. We've all experienced something like this: a cutting board that just ruins the cooking experience. That's why we made the Artisan Revere end-grain cutting board: to solve these problems once and for all.

👩‍🔬 Science Alert: End-grain wooden boards are tailor-made for keeping your knives sharper for longer. Now, we always recommend using them for non-animal proteins to eliminate the risk of cross-contamination. However, if you must only buy one board, we actually strongly recommend that board be a large end-grain board. The reason is you can prep your vegetables and all of your non-animal proteins first. Wash with soap and warm water and dry the board. And then prep your animal proteins. Once you wash it, all bacteria will be eliminated. Just remember to do animal protein last. And don't forget, bacteria also die inside the wood fibers per these three university studies diving into the safety of wood:

• UC Davis' Cliver on Cross Contamination

  
  

• UC Davis' Cliver on Experimentally Contaminated Boards

  
  

• Fulda University (Germany) Study by Lucke on the Hygienic Aspects of Wood vs Plastic Boards

However, if you take our advice and split your prep needs, you won't even have to think about cross-contamination, and that's what I prefer. The result is that your end-grain board is going to be perfect for all of your other food processing needs. i.e. vegetables, fruits, cheeses, and all of the other meal prep you engage in. And the best part... your end-grain boards can serve double duty as a serving tray and charcuterie board.

Shameless Plug: With the Artisan Revere cutting board, it's not just going to be dramatically easier to cut, our boards are also going to last a lifetime, and they're going to keep your knives sharper for much longer. And, of course, they're incredibly easy to maneuver thanks to the deep handle grooves AND 1/2" rubber feet that make picking it up underneath easy to do as well. And look, making promises is easy but that's why we give you 100 days to fall in love or your money back, guaranteed, with no questions asked (except we'll want to know how we can do better). This is why we give you the real specifications of our products and tell you exactly what you can expect.

Gentle on your knives and your hands: The Artisan Revere end-grain board, which, like all of our products is made in the USA, is going to be gentler on your knives than any other quality board. Why? We use only Tier 1 end-grain cherry and walnut woods. They're as gentle as a tight-grained hardwood gets, which means they'll keep your knives sharper for longer. In addition to the wood itself being gentle on your knife edges, we round-over the edges, corners, and handle groves to make sure your board feels nice and smooth and soft when you work with it. Because, who wants a board that's rough? Not me! And the best part, is that with just a little bit of TLC (wash + dry, mineral oil) your board is going to last a lifetime.

Who Is A Small End-Grain Cutting Board For?

The small board as we've affectionately started calling it, is one of those rare boards that has a crazy amount of versatility. Need to prep a small meal? Get your small board. Having a few guests over and need a stunning way to present your meat and cheese charcuterie plate? Get your small board. Have a tiny work space with a smaller countertop? Get your small board. Honestly, that's all there is to it. It's made with the same insane attention to detail: wood selection, joinery, glue, beveling, sanding etc. as our big board. So, yah, it's pretty great and useful. To any board makers out there, please start beveling the edges and corners of your boards. It makes for a vastly superior experience for your customers. Oh, and get those handle grooves a bit deeper and softer too! Their fingers need to actually fit and be able to grip the board!

The Plastic Cutting Board: Who Needs Them And What Are They For?

Plastic cutting boards are good for processing all sorts of foods, but if you want an optimized kitchen, we recommend keeping them for animal proteins and using your wood boards for everything else. You can, of course, use only wooden cutting boards or plastic boards, but plastic boards are extremely deleterious to the environment, and candidly, we have yet to find a plastic cutting board that we absolutely love. Those top-rated boards by OXO and the ones with best-in-class ratings on Amazon all seem to have one problem or another. We found that the OXO boards are now being made too thin, and they bend in the middle when you cut. The most common problems we find with other boards: they're harsh on your edges, they don't grip your food because they're too sleek, they feel terrible for laser-type knives, and, of course, even the ones with the rubber ends often wind up slipping and sliding around. We bought several top-rated plastic boards to test. Our favorite set is the Smirly set of 4 boards with holder. I got it for my girlfriend's house in Pink to test. We like it, but you can definitely see scratch lines nearly immediately and it's feels rough on my ultra-thin Japanese nakiri. You might be wondering, why do we even bother recommending plastic? Simple: convenience. Sometimes, you're in a rush and just want to prep, and throw everything in the dishwasher. Well, for that, you'll need a plastic board friend, because the dishwasher is the mortal enemy of wood.

The Plastic Carving Board With Juice Grooves: Do You Need It?

The Big & Small Plastic Cutting Boards We Recommend

Boards to Avoid

Materials to Avoid: Teak, acacia, bamboo, "eco-friendly composite" aka "wood fiber", which is really made with wood pulp and thermosetting resin. Trust me: we've tested all of these materials extensively. They are going to dull your knife edges incredibly fast. Unless you're a glutton for punishment and feel the need to whip out the sharpening stones or belt grinder every week, don't get any of these materials.  

Most Plastic Boards Are Junk: I recently bought another highly-rated Amazon brand: Kikcoin. 4.7/5 on Amazon. I popped these boards on the surface, and was about to cut... until the board started sliding around. Then I went into investigation mode and realized that the non-slip edging didn't go all the way to the surface on one side. Bad QC and/or design. Probably both. That's an immediate pass for me. Here's the link if you want to know what boards I'm talking about: Kikcoin 3 Boards with Juice Groove. The reality is, there are hundreds of these board brands that are being made in China. It's hard to know if they'll work out until you buy them since very few actually show you what the feet look like. More surface area for the feet will keep a board in place better.

Overhyped Plastic Board: The OXO plastic cutting boards on Amazon are fine. What I like is that there's a nice juice groove on one side, which is convenient for large cuts of meat. What I don't like is that it flexes because the board is fairly thin and the rubberized feet are a bit too tall and narrow. Because they're too tall and the board is thin, the board bows a bit in the middle. Because the feet are narrow, the board tends to slip a bit on the countertop. Either do it right or don't do it at all.

Things to Avoid with End-Grain Boards

"Wood" Boards on Amazon Are Trash: Okay, hear me out. We make high-quality end-grain boards at Artisan Revere. We're insanely meticulous. We know what materials cost. We know how much time it takes to make a board. So when we see folks marketing end-grain walnut boards at prices that are below the cost of the wood, something is seriously wrong. If you buy an end-grain wood board on Amazon, you are throwing away your money. Period. Don't do it. I can almost guarantee you that you're not getting what you think you're paying for. It's far more likely you're getting some extraordinarily cheap wood that's been stained. Et voila. You can make a cheap wood look dark with just a quick stain! See what our friends at Popular Woodworking have to say on the subject.

Design Flaws to Avoid:

• Check the wood. If it's not walnut or cherry, it's going to be sub-optimal for you edges. Maple is fine, but will dull your edges faster, will stain easily, and is very heavy.

• Check the wood details. If there are knots or splits in the wood, that board is much more likely to fall apart. Avoid.

• Check the joinery. If the board is made up of small pieces that aren't offset, the board is very likely to warp, bow, or fall apart. If the pieces aren't totally flush to one another, it means it wasn't over-glued during construction, and is likely to fall apart.

• If the edges and/or corners aren't soft, it's going to feel uncomfortable in-hand.

• If the handles haven't been smoothed, it won't feel comfortable maneuvering your board.

• If there's a juice groove, it is likely to cause the wood to rot fairly quickly. We'd avoid.

• If there are no rubber feet, it means you're likely placing a wet towel under your board as you prep. This is horrible for the wood because it will soak up all the water and warp. This is why all of our boards have rubberized feet.

Things to Avoid with Plastic Boards

Plastic Cutting Board Design Flaws to Avoid:

• Check the grippiness and make sure it doesn't slide around your countertops. This is dangerous ☠️🩸.

• Check to make sure the board isn't too sleek. It should be a bit textured. You don't want your foods slipping and sliding. This too is dangerous ☠️🩸.

• Check that the board isn't too thin, or it may bend in the middle if it has feet.

• Once the scarring on the board gets too deep, it's going to be time to throw it out, unless you want to try hand sanding it. I'm not sure I'd recommend it though.

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