Give Yourself The Chop With The Right Chopping Board
Stuck between a rock and a hard place when choosing your restaurant kitchen’s chopping boards? Let Alliance online help you choose the right one for you with this article on the two main materials available, wood versus plastic. Your restaurant, cafe or hotel kitchen needs plenty of chopping boards, they’re a basic tool and there’s no doubt these boards will be used all day, every day so having a sturdy durable and practical selection available is imperative. There’s also more to the humble chopping board than meets the eye.
Food Safety In The Kitchen
When you choose your catering chopping boards, you should label them up for different uses so there’s no risk of contamination. It’s a good idea to colour code and perhaps stick a chart on the wall so your kitchen staff understand which to use for which food type.
Use one for meat, one for fish, one for poultry, one for fruit and vegetables etc. Every time a chopping board is used best practice says it’s best to wash it immediately using soapy hot water, dry off and then re-use. This is because even if you are using the same chopping board for the same job, leave it with food residue from the last job puts your customers at risk of picking up bacteria potentially leading to food poisoning.
Wood
Wood is believed to be a better material when it comes to harbouring germs, bacteria is easily removed from wood and there have been numerous food safety tests undertaken in recent years to prove this. In fact, salmonella is removed from wood surfaces after cleaning with a good disinfectant even where a knife has created dents. Additionally, bacteria is absorbed by wood and dies quite quickly.
Wooden chopping boards are very attractive too and there’s no doubt they make a statement in any kitchen, commercial or domestic. Plastic chopping boardsneeds to be replaced faster than wood chopping boards because over time, the surface tends to deteriorate and bacteria lives in the marks on these boards created by knives. There are other advantages to wood, purchase a high quality wooden butcher’s block or well-treated wooden chopping boards and they can last you for up to 20 years, looked after well.
Wooden chopping boards and butcher’s blocks should be maintained and looked after so treat the wooden surfaces well. It’s recommended to treat wooden boards once a month or every other month to stop them drying out and cracking but treat them as often as you want depending on how often you use them.
A very cracked or scratched board can be re-sanded and re-used but if damage is light, here’s how to look after them well so they last a lifetime:
- Choose a good quality wax treatment or mineral oil especially for wooden chopping boards/butcher’s blocks
- Wash the board in hot, soapy water and allow to dry
- Rub the oil gently over the wooden board using a soft cloth
- Leave it for approximately 10 minutes to absorb
- Remove any excess oil
- Your board is ready to use!
Different Wood Boards
There are different wood board types too:
- End Grain Boards are very high quality and are able to resist heavy knife use plus they are easier on your knives too preventing too much damage and keeping them sharper for longer. The end grain boards are made by combining wood sections vertically.
- Edge Grain Boards use long pieces of wood and make a good quality board which is more commonplace and less expensive to purchase. Bear in mind that edge grain boards do blunt knives faster than end grain and they also are less resistant to knife markings.
Here’s our pick of the best wooden chopping boards:
- Round Wooden Chopping Board (25cm)
- Rectangular Slatted Bread Board
- Hardboard Steak Board (with grooves for juice)
Plastic
Don’t be put off by plastic catering chopping boards because they are used all over the country in restaurants, hotels, cafes, coffee shops and in the home. It’s been thought for years that plastic is better for meat and fish over wooden boards but you might choose to use plastic for cutting pastry products, fruit and vegetables. However, if properly and washed in the right conditions plastic chopping boards work just as well for all food and are just as safe as their wooden brothers.
Here are our pick of the best plastic chopping boards:
- Colour Coded Chopping Boards in a variety of shades
- Polyethylene Chopping Board (especially to prevent cross-contamination)
- Prof Board (won’t dull your knives and suitable for dishwasher plus chip and warp resistant!)
For all your chopping and cutting needs,click here & visit the Alliance website where you will find a variety of different chopping boards and knives for restaurant and hotel use.