As with many things, not all wood is created equal. In the case of wooden cutting boards, there are specific varieties you'll see commonly, and you may wonder: does it matter what type of wood is used? The answer is certainly yes.
Hardwoods vs. Softwoods
Depending on the species of tree the lumber is harvested from, one of the key characteristics is the "hardness" of the wood. Evergreens, like most varieties of pine, are the classic example of "soft" woods. They're more porous and less dense, partly as a function of their faster growth cycles. These woods are great for construction and general purposes, but they don't make good food surfaces at all. They're more absorbent, and often oily and aromatic — all of which are undesirable when you're preparing or serving food on them.
Hardwoods — what variety is best?
Many (but not all) hardwoods can be fashioned into perfectly great cutting boards. The best ones share a few key characteristics: tighter fibers, smaller pores, and medium-to-high density ("hardness"). For those of us in North America, three varieties stand out as the most popular for classic cutting boards: Maple, Walnut and Cherry. You can't go wrong with these classics, provided the board is well-designed and well-constructed! Now, none of this is to say that other varieties of hardwood can't make great cutting boards; there are dozens, if not hundreds, of varieties that will certainly do the job (more on some of those later).
Domestic hardwood showdown
If you're torn between the big three species of hardwood, here are some of the characteristics that set each apart:
Maple — this is the classic choice for what we'd call heavy duty chefs. Maple has a tight, straight grain and sits on the harder side of the hardwoods (but not too hard). It's been the staple of butcher blocks and butcher block countertops for well over a century. Maple has a lighter color profile, ranging from tan to light brown depending on the exact cut of wood and its orientation. There's typically a little less contrast and character in the patterning, so you're going to get a more uniform, clean appearance with fewer frills and quirks.
Walnut — another staple in American and European cutting boards. Walnut, also known as Black Walnut, stands out for its visual appeal, and it's the anchor of our portfolio at Wooded Carving Co. It's slightly less dense than Maple, which gives it a lighter weight and a softer feel under a knife. While it is a bit softer, it's still very durable and suitable for virtually all sorts of cooks. Walnut not only has a tremendous amount of visual contrast, each piece varies fairly widely in character: from one piece of Walnut to another, you'll see different shades of color, different flows and shapes of grain, and different unique forms of figuring, where the wood takes on unique shapes and patterning. Within a single piece of Walnut lumber, you'll find a very dark "heartwood" that lies at the core of the tree, and rather light (nearly Maple-colored) "sapwood" that sits closer to the edge of the trunk. At Wooded, this visual contrast between Walnut heartwood and sapwood is one of our favorite ways to create unique, one-of-a-kind cutting boards. Walnut also changes as it ages: it tends to mellow, with the deepest browns warming and lightening toward amber, especially where a board catches sunlight.
Cherry — this species is a great middle point, with a color profile all its own. As the name would imply, Cherry has a brown color with a distinct reddish hue to it. Like Walnut, there's a contrast between heartwood and sapwood, with the sapwood exhibiting a tan to yellowish tint. We also construct a lot of boards from Cherry, and notice a subtle but distinct variation of character in its end grain — from piece to piece of Cherry, you'll see different shades of color and different widths and shapes of grain. In terms of aging, Cherry generally gets darker, leaning toward its deeper reddish-brown hues and losing some of the brighter character it has when freshly finished.
Other woods
As you may know, there are many other domestic hardwoods beyond the big three mentioned above. Many of them are suitable for cutting board use, but may not be optimal for one reason or another — and some of those reasons are the subject of debate, speculation and big opinions. One common example is Oak, which many woodworkers assert has too large and porous a grain structure, particularly in the Red Oak variety. Other woods fall outside of the hardness "envelope," either being too soft to stand up to heavy usage (Willow and Poplar, for example), or so hard that they can dull knives, especially in edge/long grain boards.
Other wood species may be well-suited for cutting boards but are more sensitive: best used for lighter duty, and stricter about proper care. We'd say Hickory fits the bill here. We do find Hickory visually compelling and special to us, so we make boards out of it regularly. As long as you aren't soaking your Hickory board daily, and you're taking regular care of it with an oil and wax made for cutting boards, it'll hold up beautifully. We also work in the occasional piece of exotics...
Exotic species
Looking beyond North American hardwoods, there are many hundreds of species of hardwood, many of which (particularly in tropical regions) exhibit unique and beautiful visual characteristics. Common varieties found in cutting boards include Purpleheart (a vivid purple when freshly cut, deepening toward brown-purple over time), Padauk (bright orange-red when fresh, darkening to a deep red), Bubinga and Acacia. Some of these woods are better than others for boards, for similar reasons as discussed above. We've used Padauk and Canarywood in the occasional board, generally as a limited series, as we find inspiration!
Exotic woods come with distinct challenges for US woodworkers. The first is obviously the cost, as these varieties require far more extensive land and ocean transportation. Availability can be a challenge too; while we as a maker have a fantastic supplier with abundant inventories, there is simply less lumber to choose from in these lower-volume exotic species, so we have fewer opportunities to find interesting and suitable pieces within them. And finally, with some varieties of exotic wood, the responsibility of harvesting and forestry practices can be less certain than with domestic hardwoods, which are sustainably harvested by and large.
Conclusion
At Wooded Carving Company, we really love the palette the domestic hardwoods offer: so much variety and contrast, in tried-and-true woods that have been widely used and proven for cutting boards. Importantly for us, we can source from a wide variety of these common species and hand-select the unique, vibrant pieces that suit our style of artistry. We can also do so with confidence that these woods are sustainably harvested and transported relatively short distances, domestically. Given our artisan philosophy — one that takes inspiration from nature's abundance — we find that domestic woods offer so much visual depth that we generally stick to them for our base aesthetic.
