The Antithesis

The Antithesis: What We Will Never Be

We need to talk about the dark secret of the kitchenware industry.

Go to any big-box store. Look at the aisles of cutting boards and kitchen accessories. They look shiny. They look "eco-friendly." They are cheap.

But they are ruining your food, destroying your knives, and quietly poisoning your family.

At The Wood Chef, we draw a hard line in the sand. Here are the three mass-market trends we vehemently oppose, and why we will never incorporate them into our craft.

1. We Will Never Use Bamboo.

Bamboo has been marketed as the ultimate "eco-friendly" cutting board material. It grows fast, it's cheap, and it looks decent.

**The Reality:** Bamboo is not wood. It is a grass. And to make it hard enough to act as a cutting surface, it contains high levels of naturally occurring **silica** (essentially glass). Every time your $150 Japanese chef's knife strikes a bamboo board, it is literally hitting glass. Bamboo will dull a premium blade faster than almost any other material on earth.

We only use premium hardwoods like Sapele (African Mahogany) that respect and protect your blade's edge.

2. We Will Never Use Petroleum-Based Mineral Oil.

Flip over almost any commercial cutting board oil or conditioner. The primary ingredient is "Food Grade Mineral Oil."

"Food Grade" sounds safe. But mineral oil is a petroleum distillate. It is a liquid byproduct of refining crude oil to make gasoline and other petroleum products. The industry uses it because it is dirt cheap and doesn't go rancid.

We refuse to coat an organic, beautiful piece of wood in a byproduct of the oil industry. We finish our boards with **Organic MCT Oil** (from coconuts) and **Raw Beeswax** harvested from local apiaries. Real ingredients for real food.

3. We Will Never Build Plastic Micro-Factories.

Plastic cutting boards were supposed to be the "sanitary" alternative to wood because you can throw them in the dishwasher.

**The Reality:** Every time you slice into a plastic cutting board, you create microscopic grooves. Bacteria thrive in these grooves and are nearly impossible to wash out. Even worse, your knife is slicing off tiny, invisible shards of plastic.

A recent study showed that chopping on plastic boards can expose humans to tens of millions of microplastic particles annually. Those particles go directly into the chicken or vegetables you are chopping, and then into your body.

Solid hardwood has naturally occurring antimicrobial properties. Bacteria that falls into the pores of wood dies rapidly. It is the way food was meant to be prepared.

Our Guarantee

We don't do mass production. We don't do cheap. We build heirloom pieces out of solid Sapele that elevate your kitchen and respect the food you cook. No compromises.