Okay so here are a few helpful hints that I learned about caring for cutting boards:
This is how to make your wooden cutting boards last you for years:
1. Sanitize cutting boards with a solution of peroxide and water-you can use a solution of bleach and water-but you need to make sure you make it up fresh because bleach solution will lose 50% of it's strength after about 2 hours. (I didn't know that one). After you sanitize-rinse and let dry completety
2. Never soak or put cutting boards in dishwasher.
3. Use both sides of your cutting board-using just one side only can cause it to warp.
4. Oiling a cutting board is essential because detergents and soaps used for cleaning tend to dry out the wood, causing splits and an overall shorter useful lifespan. Mineral oil, beeswax, cocount or almond oil all can be used. Apply with clean cloth over the dry board and set up to dry a few hours-you can apply more if needed. Do about once a month. You can use olive oil too-but it can get a kind of rancid smell to it-so whatever you choose.
5. To remove stains and odors from a cutting board-cut a lemon in half and scrub the cutting board with it.
Just a little hint: Use your plastic cutting boards for vegitables/fruits only-As the cut marks on plastic cutting boards are harder to manually clean-and you may not be able to completely clean all bacteria out of these nicks- on a wooden cutting board-even if you don't get the cut grooves completely clean-after the wood dries-bacteria evidently doesn't multiply and will gradually die. So if you plan on using your plastic cutting boards for everything-make sure you wash them in a dishwasher or even nuking them in the microwave will help kill off any remaining baceteria.
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