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Naturally, you want to protect yourself and your family from food-borne illnesses when you cook at home. You know that uncooked beef, especially hamburger, may carry E. coli bacteria, and that the chicken sold in American supermarkets carries salmonella. You cook meat thoroughly, wash your hands, and never cut vegetables on the same cutting board or with the same knife you have just used for raw meat. But chances are you still wonder if you really cleaned up well enough after you cooked that chicken, or if your medium-rare steaks are safe to eat. One of the many decisions you face is whether to use wooden or plastic cutting boards, and you’ve probably heard conflicting answers to that question. Which cutting board you choose will affect both food safety and cooking performance.
Cutting Boards and Food Safety
Wooden cutting boards were once the standard, until experts began to suggest that because wood is a more porous surface than plastic, wooden cutting boards would trap bacteria even after washing and be less sanitary than plastic cutting boards. The Department of Agriculture recommends that home cooks use plastic cutting boards. From the beginning, however, there has been debate over whether plastic cutting boards, although they are easier to clean when new, are actually safer, with some experts insisting that wood has natural properties that protect against bacteria. Even the government recommendations are conflicting; government regulations for restaurants refer only to wooden cutting boards and do not specifically authorize the use of any type of plastic.
The most recent research suggests that although it is more difficult to clean bacteria from a new wooden cutting board than a new plastic board, over time plastic loses the advantage. Plastic cutting boards develop grooves that even dishwashers find hard to clean. While dishwasher cleaning is more effective than hand cleaning in the sink, a household water heater cannot get the water in a dishwasher hot enough to kill all the bacteria. The next time you use the cutting board, your knife can pick up bacteria from the surface as you’re cutting new food. By contrast, even when a wooden cutting board has been well-used, the bacteria present under the surface do not appear to transfer to the knife after the board has been cleaned.
With the available research, neither kind of cutting board has a definitive hygienic edge. If you use plastic cutting boards, throw them away when they become scarred with many knife cuts. Both wooden and plastic cutting boards should be cleaned thoroughly after use with hot soap and water and then kept quite dry when not in use, as bacteria cannot survive long without moisture. It is also a good idea to disinfect your cutting boards, especially if you will be cutting vegetables to eat raw on a board that was used for chicken or meat earlier in the day. To disinfect, use one tablespoon of chlorine bleach to one quart of water, cover the surface of the board with the solution, and let stand several minutes. If you frequently cook with chicken, consider owning a separating cutting board just for chicken, or even having three boards altogether- one for chicken, one for other meats, and one for vegetables and fruits- so that you can more effectively prevent cross-contamination while cooking.
Wooden cutting boards require special care. They must not be soaked in water and most should not go in the dishwasher. After washing, they will dry best if leaned up against something rather than laid flat. To keep your board in good, safe condition, oil it regularly (weekly or monthly) with food grade mineral oil. Rub the oil in the direction of the grain with a soft cloth, allow the oil to soak in, and then wipe up any excess. Do not use a vegetable-based oil, as these will spoil. Replace your cutting board if the wood shows obvious damage such as splintering, cracking, dents, or grooves.
Cutting Boards and Cooking Performance
Expert cooks seem to unanimously prefer cooking on wooden cutting boards. Their primary advantage is that the softer surface of wood is easier on knives, which will need less frequent sharpening and will last longer than if they are used with a plastic (or, even worse, glass) cutting board. If you are a serious cook, you will probably want to use wood. One sign that you might be a serious cook: you have a set of knives that no one else is allowed to touch, and you sharpen them regularly. You make the kids wash your pots and pans by hand, and you have rules about what kind of utensils can be used with them. You make cooking a mini-event, and have the patience to take proper care of equipment like a cutting board that needs to be oiled.
For casual cooks, the convenience of plastic will be the deciding factor. If you constantly find trying to squeeze in dinner that doesn’t come from a sack in between soccer practice and the PTA meeting, you’ll want to toss your cutting board in the dishwasher and be done with it. Just make sure that you replace your cutting board when it becomes worn, and consider owning more than one board.
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