Can anyone tell me the best material to use for the finish on wooden salad bowls?
RubiconCabs
Can anyone tell me the best material to use for the finish on wooden salad bowls?
RubiconCabs
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Replies
Mineral oil. Maybe throw in a little beeswax.
Oils for use on food surfaces:
Generally a drying oil is preferred. Here is a list of oils often used for salad bowls.
No oil (Use will slowly give it a finish preferred by many craftsmen.)
Walnut oil (Most often advised. Drying, resists rancidity, darkens over time)
Olive oil (Not drying, but fairly resistant to rancidity)
Cottonseed (The pesticides allowed for cotton are not typically allowed for food products.)
Linseed (Do not use, this is often treated with toxic drying agents.)
Flax Seed oil (Edible linseed oil available at healthfood stores, not quite as bad tasting as castor oil, but still horrid.)
Safflower Oil (The fastest drying neutral taste oil. It yellows with time the least of any oil. Lighter colored oil paints often use safflower oil. This is my personal favorite. )
Whenever I use an oil, I mix in R.O.E. This is Rosemary Oleoresin. It is the best antioxident available for oils. When I open the bottle I add a teaspoon per gallon of oil. This reduces the chance of oil going rancid on the shelf or rancid on the bowl.
forgot motor oil... :> )
Drying oils should actually dry. This leaves a nice hard resin. T However resins are often soliuble in oil. When you make a salad you often introduce non-drying oils that will bond with the resins and make for sticky oils. Mineral oil soaks in and protects wood but it does not harden, bind with or otherwise "nourish" the wood. If you use a mineral oil be absolutly sure you use a food grade mineral oil. Mineral oil does not ever "lock" into the wood so it tends to eventualy bleed, evaporate or wash out. A drying oil will tend to seal the wood, "lock-in" to the wood and strengthen it. Tung oil is one I left out, but if you can get it without risky additives it hardens to a very hard finish. Millie's Wood Oil is reccomended by mainwoodbowls.com. The argument for no finish is backed up by this article, kind of a must read for wood users: http://www.rhtubs.com/wood-bacteria.htm The original data was from Science News. Tips 30-35 at http://www.woodcentral.com/russ/russ5.shtml read as follows:
30 Wood cannot be made into something that it is not: waterproof. If you want waterproof, consider making the vessel from glass or porcelain.
31 Before using Mineral Oil, keep the customer in mind (again). Ask yourself if you would want to use a salad bowl that was covered with the same thing that your mother gave you as a laxative when you were a child.
32 That didn't do it? If you wouldn't put motor oil on the wood, why would you want to use Mineral Oil? They are the same thing. (This one always gets an argument!)
33 There is no such thing as a "food-safe" finish. Somewhere, sometime, someone will be found who has an allergy to anything that we can put on the surface of a piece of wood, or to the wood itself. If it considered as being safe, it's because that person hasn't been found, yet.
34 Woodturners and chemical companies are the only people who believe that, "All finishes are food-safe after the solvents have evaporated." Try explaining this logic to a generation of folks who believe that their health has suffered from "Better living through chemistry."
Article such as this one make me wonder if soap might be brought into the discussion.: http://groups.msn.com/WorldofWoodturners/processinggreentimber.msnw
As for me however, it is safflower if I want a light bowl, and nothing if I want it dark.
You should use mineral oil for any wood object used for food.
I've noticed that most oils get sticky over time. Is that what the antioxidant prevents?
Janet
I've never seen a drying oil get sticky once it's dry, regardless of how old it is.<P>
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