Oiling Wooden Goods
By: Zak Shaw
Spoons, the ultimate kitchen utensil. You use them to eat your cereal, cook your food, or serve mash potatoes. You let one accidentally sit in a bowl of water in the sink for a day or leave it unwashed in your lunch box over the weekend. Spoons and other wooden kitchen utensil go through a rough cycle. So how do you keep them looking good and well cared for? How do you keep your charcuterie board looking nice? What about furniture? How do you keep that nice look that protects the wood but without using dangerous chemicals that in the long run are bad for you? Let's talk wood finishes! or as I like to say Goods finishes.
So first, when considering a food safe wood finish there are a lot of options. I immediately eliminate any wood finishes that contain chemical solvents and curing agents that produce fumes. We are cooking and serving food with these items and I don't know about you but I don't want any of those dangerous chemicals in or around my food. I want to use a polymerizing oil which hardens in the wood and creates a protective coating that water cannot penetrate. Polymerizing oils are walnut oil, hemp oil, linseed oil, and pure tung oil. I'm sure there are more but those are the ones I know of.
So first, when considering a food safe wood finish there are a lot of options. I immediately eliminate any wood finishes that contain chemical solvents and curing agents that produce fumes. We are cooking and serving food with these items and I don't know about you but I don't want any of those dangerous chemicals in or around my food. I want to use a polymerizing oil which hardens in the wood and creates a protective coating that water cannot penetrate. Polymerizing oils are walnut oil, hemp oil, linseed oil, and pure tung oil. I'm sure there are more but those are the ones I know of.
My favorite is 100% pure tung oil. With Tung oil and linseed oil you have to be careful. You can't go to your local hardware store and pick up any can of tung oil or boiled linseed oil. Those have a lot of chemicals and drying agents in them. You want to make sure you have an all natural product so check those labels. I buy my pure tung oil from The Real Milk Paint Co. I like to cut my Tung oil with a citrus solvent at a ratio of 1:1. This allows for the tung oil to absorb into the wood better.
Below are some pictures that go over my oiling process; which can be applied to a variety of wooden goods including spoons and picture frames.
After my first application I repeat the process 3-4 times giving a couple days between coats for the oil to dry. Each coat is a layer of protection and the more layer's you apply, the better protected your piece is.
So why not beeswax or mineral oil? When I first started making spoons I finished them with mineral oil or beeswax but found that the finish would fade over time or after one wash! Mineral oil never dries so it kinda just washes off, whereas the heat from hot water is enough to pull the beeswax out of a spoon. Tung oil creates a nice protective layer that can keep a spoon looking crisp even when regularly washed for more than a year or two in my experience.
Recently I have been making charcuterie boards and finishing them with tung oil. The Tung oil really keeps the Grain of the wood looking sharp and makes me happy but the knife marks are really pronounced and catch my eye. I have started to wax my boards 3-4 times and then finish them with tung oil afterword in order to seal in the wax. Some people mix tung oil and beeswax or linseed oil and bees wax and have really good success. The wax fills in the cut marks left behind by the knife and almost gives the board a Healing affect.
So, from my experience Pure tung oil is durable, easy to use and effective and my recommendation for wooden kitchen utensils, picture frames and furniture. Why put your self in contact with so many harmful chemicals when there is a natural way to finish your wooden wares that is so effective?
I first saturate my rag. (Pro tip if you need a rag we have a blog post about it check it out, 5 uses for old sheets!) Then I rub my spoons or other wooden object, so there is a generous amount of oil all over the wood. If it seems to be soaking in fast I will re-apply generously after about ten minutes.
Once the wood is completely saturated I let it sit to soak in the oil for 45 minutes.
I then rub off any extra oil with a new rag, wait an hour or two and rub the wood again in case any oil is left over or is coming out of the grain.
If you do not wipe away your tung oil, it will dry and leave spots of rough raised oil on your piece. As an extra precaution, because the oil can come out of the wood grain for over 24 hours, I like to check the piece I'm oiling the next day and wipe away any extra oil I notice.
So why not beeswax or mineral oil? When I first started making spoons I finished them with mineral oil or beeswax but found that the finish would fade over time or after one wash! Mineral oil never dries so it kinda just washes off, whereas the heat from hot water is enough to pull the beeswax out of a spoon. Tung oil creates a nice protective layer that can keep a spoon looking crisp even when regularly washed for more than a year or two in my experience.
Recently I have been making charcuterie boards and finishing them with tung oil. The Tung oil really keeps the Grain of the wood looking sharp and makes me happy but the knife marks are really pronounced and catch my eye. I have started to wax my boards 3-4 times and then finish them with tung oil afterword in order to seal in the wax. Some people mix tung oil and beeswax or linseed oil and bees wax and have really good success. The wax fills in the cut marks left behind by the knife and almost gives the board a Healing affect.
So, from my experience Pure tung oil is durable, easy to use and effective and my recommendation for wooden kitchen utensils, picture frames and furniture. Why put your self in contact with so many harmful chemicals when there is a natural way to finish your wooden wares that is so effective?
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