I have a wooden spoon in my kitchen right now that I have been cooking with for over thirty years. The handle is worn smooth where my hand wraps around it, and the edge of the bowl has a slight curve from tens of thousands of stirs in my cast iron skillet. It does not look like much to anybody walking through, but that spoon has stirred more gravies, more pots of greens, and more batches of cornbread batter than I could ever count. It is one of the most important tools I own, and the only reason it has lasted this long is because I have taken care of it.
The same goes for my cutting boards. I have a thick maple board that sits on my counter every single day. It is where I chop onions for my trinity, where I slice tomatoes in the summer, where I break down a chicken before it goes in the skillet. That board has seen thousands of meals, and it is still solid, still smooth, still doing its job — because I have never once put it in the dishwasher, and I have never once let it sit in a puddle of water.
Wooden kitchen tools are not fancy. They are not expensive. But they are essential to the way I cook, and to the way most Southern kitchens have always worked. A good wooden spoon does not scratch your Cast Iron Cooking: The Southern Way the way a metal one will. A solid cutting board gives you a surface that is kind to your knives and steady under your hands. These are the quiet workhorses of the kitchen, and if you treat them right, they will outlast just about everything else you own.
This is everything I know about keeping them clean, keeping them conditioned, and keeping them working the way they should for years and years to come.
Why Wood Belongs in a Southern Kitchen
There is a reason your grandmother used wooden spoons and not plastic ones, and it was not because she did not have other options. Wood is gentle on cookware. It does not conduct heat the way metal does, so you can leave a wooden spoon sitting in a pot of simmering soup and pick it up without burning your hand. It does not scrape the seasoning off your cast iron or scratch the bottom of your enameled Dutch oven. It moves through thick batters and heavy roux without bending or flexing.
A wooden cutting board is the same kind of practical. It is easier on your knife edges than glass or plastic. It does not slide around the counter the way a thin plastic board will. And when you are breaking down a chicken or chopping a pile of vegetables for a big pot of stew, a solid wooden board gives you a surface you can trust. It stays put. It absorbs the impact of the blade instead of fighting against it.
Wood also has something that surprises a lot of people — it is naturally better at fighting bacteria than plastic. The grain of the wood pulls bacteria down below the surface where it cannot survive. A plastic board with deep knife scars will harbor bacteria in those grooves no matter how hard you scrub it. A wooden board, properly cleaned, does not have that problem. I did not know the science behind it when I started using wood fifty years ago, but I knew what worked and what did not, and my kitchen has always been a wooden kitchen.
The Number One Rule — Keep Them Dry
If I could only tell you one thing about caring for wooden spoons and cutting boards, it would be this: water is the enemy when it sits. Washing them with water is fine. Letting them soak in water will ruin them.
When wood sits in water — or worse, goes through the dishwasher — the grain absorbs that moisture and swells. Then when it dries, it contracts. That swelling and shrinking cycle is what causes cracking, warping, and splitting. I have seen beautiful cutting boards split right down the middle because someone left them soaking in the sink overnight. I have seen spoons with handles that cracked in half after going through the dishwasher a few times. Once that damage is done, there is no fixing it.
The dishwasher is the worst thing you can do to a piece of wood in your kitchen. The combination of high heat, harsh detergent, and prolonged exposure to water and steam will destroy a wooden spoon or cutting board faster than anything else. I do not care what anybody says about modern dishwashers being gentle. They are not gentle on wood. Not even a little bit.
So the rule is simple: wash by hand, dry right away, and never let them sit in standing water. That one habit will add years to the life of every wooden tool in your kitchen.
How to Wash Wooden Spoons the Right Way
Washing a wooden spoon is not complicated, but there is a right way and a wrong way. The right way takes about thirty seconds and keeps your spoons in good shape for decades.
After you finish cooking, rinse the spoon under warm water. Not hot — warm. Extremely hot water can shock the wood the same way soaking can. Use a little bit of regular dish soap and your hand or a soft sponge to wipe the spoon clean. If there is stuck-on food, a gentle scrub with the soft side of a sponge will handle it. Do not use steel wool, do not use the abrasive side of a scrub pad, and do not use anything that will gouge or scratch the surface of the wood.
Once it is clean, shake off the excess water and dry it with a clean towel. Then — and this is the part most people skip — stand it upright or lay it on a towel where air can reach all sides. Do not throw it in a drawer while it is still damp. Do not lay it flat on the counter where the bottom side stays wet. Let it air dry completely before you put it away.
If a spoon picks up a strong smell — garlic is the usual culprit, or onions — you can rub it down with a cut lemon or make a paste of baking soda and water, let it sit for a minute or two, then rinse and dry as usual. That will pull the smell right out without damaging the wood.
How to Wash and Clean a Wooden Cutting Board
Cutting boards need a little more attention than spoons because they deal with raw meat, poultry, and all sorts of things that you want to make sure are cleaned up properly. But the method is still simple.
After every use, scrub the board with warm water and dish soap using a sponge or a brush. Get both sides, and get the edges too. If you have been cutting raw chicken or pork on it, be thorough — scrub the entire surface well. Then rinse it under warm running water, shake it off, and dry it immediately with a clean towel. Stand it upright to finish air drying so both sides can breathe.
For a deeper clean — and I do this about once a week, or any time I have been doing heavy meat work — sprinkle the board with coarse salt, then use half a lemon as your scrubber. The salt acts as a gentle abrasive and the acid from the lemon sanitizes the surface. Scrub the whole board with the lemon and salt, let it sit for just a minute or two, then rinse and dry. Your board will look brighter, smell clean, and be ready for the next job.
Some people like to spray their boards with a solution of white vinegar and water after washing. That is fine — one part vinegar to four parts water in a spray bottle works well. Spray it on, let it sit for a moment, then wipe it off and dry the board. I do this sometimes, but the soap-and-water method with the weekly salt-and-lemon treatment has been my routine for years and it has never let me down.
One thing I want to say clearly: you do not need to worry about using a wooden board for raw meat as long as you wash it properly afterward. People have been cutting meat on wooden boards for a lot longer than plastic has existed, and the wood itself helps by pulling bacteria below the surface where it dies. Just wash it well, dry it, and do not overthink it.
How to Oil and Condition Your Wooden Tools
Washing keeps your wooden tools clean. Oiling keeps them alive. Wood is a natural material, and just like your skin, it dries out over time. When wooden spoons and cutting boards get too dry, the grain starts to look ashy and rough, the surface feels fuzzy instead of smooth, and that is when cracking starts. A little oil on a regular basis prevents all of that.
The oil you want is food-grade mineral oil. You can find it at any grocery store or pharmacy — it is the same stuff, just make sure it says food-grade on the label. Mineral oil does not go rancid the way cooking oils do, which is why it is the right choice for this job. Do not use olive oil, do not use vegetable oil, and do not use coconut oil. They will go rancid over time and your board will start to smell off and get sticky. I know people say coconut oil is fine, but I have seen too many boards go bad from it. Mineral oil is cheap, it works, and it will not cause you problems.
For cutting boards, pour a generous amount of mineral oil onto the surface and spread it around with a clean cloth or a paper towel. Work it into the grain, cover the top, the bottom, and all four edges. Then let it soak in. I like to oil my boards at night and let them sit overnight so the oil has time to really penetrate the wood. In the morning, wipe off any excess with a dry cloth, and the board will look rich and smooth and feel solid in your hands again.
For spoons, the process is the same but smaller. Pour a little oil into your hand or onto a cloth and rub it all over the spoon — the bowl, the handle, every surface. Let it soak in for a few hours, then wipe off the excess.
How often should you do this? For a cutting board that gets daily use, once a month is a good rhythm. If the board starts to look dry or feel rough before that, oil it sooner. For spoons, every couple of months is usually enough, but use your eyes and your hands. When the wood looks thirsty — light, ashy, rough — it is time.
What Kind of Wood to Look For
Not all wood is the same, and the type of wood your spoons and boards are made from makes a real difference in how they hold up over time.
For cutting boards, you want a hardwood with a tight grain. Maple is the gold standard — hard, dense, and it holds up to heavy knife work without scarring too badly. Walnut is another excellent choice. It is a little softer than maple but still very durable, and it is beautiful. Cherry is fine too, though it will show knife marks more quickly than maple or walnut.
What you do not want is a softwood like pine. Pine is too soft — it will gouge deeply every time you use a knife on it, and those deep gouges are hard to clean and can harbor bacteria. Bamboo is popular and affordable, but it is harder on your knives than maple and it tends to split along the seams where the strips are glued together. If you buy a bamboo board, know that it is not going to last as long as a solid hardwood board, and it will need more frequent oiling.
For spoons, hardwoods are still best. Beechwood, olive wood, and maple are all good choices. Olive wood spoons are beautiful and incredibly hard — they last forever if you take care of them. Beechwood is what most of the good commercial wooden spoons are made from, and it holds up well. Stay away from anything that feels lightweight and soft in your hand. Pick up a wooden spoon in the store and feel the weight of it. A good one has some heft. A cheap one feels like it might snap if you stir a thick roux with it.
When you are buying a cutting board, look for one that is at least an inch and a quarter thick. A thin board will warp more easily and it will not last. A thick board has the mass to stay flat and the depth to be resurfaced if it ever needs it. End-grain boards — where the wood fibers are facing up — are the kindest to your knives and the most durable, but they are more expensive. Edge-grain boards, where the fibers run horizontally, are more affordable and still excellent. Either one is a good choice for your kitchen.
I keep one large board for everyday work and a smaller one for quick jobs. If you are building a kitchen from scratch, as I talk about in Building a Southern Kitchen on a Budget: The 5 Essential Tools, a good cutting board is one of the first things you should invest in.
When to Sand and When to Replace
If your cutting board has gotten rough, fuzzy, or has deep knife scars that do not come clean no matter how well you scrub, it might be time for a light sanding. This is not something you need to do often — maybe once a year if you use your board every day, or less if you keep it well-oiled.
Get a piece of medium-grit sandpaper — around 150 grit — and sand the entire surface, going with the grain of the wood. You do not need to take off a lot of material. You are just smoothing out the rough spots and the knife scars. Once you have gone over the whole surface, switch to a finer grit — 220 is good — and go over it again to smooth everything out. Wipe the board down with a damp cloth to remove the dust, let it dry, and then give it a good coat of mineral oil. It will look and feel almost new.
For spoons, sanding works too. If the bowl of your spoon has gotten rough or splintery, a light sanding with fine-grit sandpaper will smooth it right out. Just be gentle — you do not want to change the shape of the spoon, just smooth the surface.
Now, there are times when wood is past saving. If a cutting board has cracked all the way through, or if it has warped so badly that it rocks on the counter, it is time to let it go. If a spoon has split or cracked down the handle, it is done. A crack in a spoon is not just a cosmetic issue — it is a place where food and bacteria can get trapped, and no amount of cleaning will reach inside that crack. Thank it for its service and move on.
The same goes for mold. If you see black spots deep in the grain of a cutting board that will not come out with scrubbing, that is mold that has penetrated the wood. A light surface discoloration can sometimes be sanded out, but if the mold has gone deep, the board needs to be replaced.
Common Mistakes That Ruin Wooden Tools
I have already mentioned the two biggest ones — the dishwasher and soaking — but there are a few more mistakes I see people make that I want to address.
Storing boards flat and wet is a bad habit. If you wash your board and lay it flat on the counter while it is still damp, the bottom side cannot dry. That trapped moisture leads to warping and, eventually, mold. Always stand your board upright after washing, or prop it against the backsplash at an angle so air reaches both sides.
Using the wrong oils is something I touched on earlier, but it bears repeating. Olive oil, vegetable oil, and canola oil will go rancid in the wood. You might not notice it right away, but after a few weeks your board will develop a sour, off smell that is very hard to get rid of. Stick with food-grade mineral oil. It is odorless, tasteless, does not go rancid, and it does exactly what you need it to do.
Cutting on both sides of the board and not cleaning in between is another one. If you chop onions on one side and then flip the board over to cut something else, you have just put whatever was on the bottom of the board — which has been sitting on your counter — onto your food surface. Use one side for cutting, and if you need more space, wash the board and start fresh.
Exposing your boards to extreme heat is bad too. Do not set a hot pan on a wooden cutting board, and do not store boards directly above the stove where heat and steam rise constantly. That kind of repeated heat exposure will dry the wood out faster than anything and lead to cracks and warping.
How to Remove Stains and Odors
Stains and odors are part of life with wood. If you cook the way I do — a lot of tomato sauces, a lot of onions and garlic, a lot of dark greens — your spoons and boards are going to pick up some color and some smell over time. Most of the time that is perfectly fine and nothing to worry about.
But if you want to brighten things up, the salt-and-lemon method I mentioned earlier works beautifully. Coarse salt as the scrubber, a fresh lemon as your tool. The acid cuts through odors and lightens stains, and the salt provides just enough abrasion to lift discoloration from the surface without damaging the wood.
For stubborn odors — raw onion and garlic are the worst offenders — a paste of baking soda and water works well. Spread it on the board or rub it onto the spoon, let it sit for five to ten minutes, then scrub and rinse. Baking soda is a natural deodorizer and it will pull those smells right out.
Hydrogen peroxide can help with stubborn stains too. A three-percent solution — the kind you buy at the pharmacy — can be poured directly onto the stained area of a cutting board. Let it fizz and sit for a few minutes, then rinse thoroughly and dry. This is a good option for boards that have developed a dark discoloration from beet juice, berries, or other deeply colored foods.
Whatever you do, do not reach for bleach. Bleach is too harsh for wood. It can damage the grain, leave a chemical residue that is hard to rinse away completely, and it dries the wood out badly. There is no stain or smell on a cutting board that is worth using bleach for. The gentler methods work just as well without the risk.
A Word About Wooden Spoon Shapes and What They Are For
Not all wooden spoons are the same shape, and those different shapes are not decoration — they are designed for specific jobs. Having the right shape for the job makes your cooking easier and more efficient.
A standard round-bowled spoon is your all-purpose stirrer. This is the one I reach for most often. It moves through soups, stews, sauces, and batters easily and it holds a good amount of liquid for tasting.
A flat-edged wooden spoon — sometimes called a roux spoon or a spatula spoon — is what you want for anything that needs scraping along the bottom of the pan. When you are making a roux, as I teach in Roux: The Foundation of Southern Cooking, a flat-edged spoon lets you keep constant contact with the bottom of the pan so nothing sticks and nothing burns. It is also the right tool for deglazing, for Smothering: The Southern Method of Braising Explained, and for any dish where fond is building up on the pan surface and you need to work it loose.
A slotted wooden spoon is for lifting things out of liquid while leaving the liquid behind. This is useful when you are pulling vegetables out of a blanching pot or serving beans out of their pot likker without draining the whole thing.
A corner spoon — one with a pointed edge — is made for getting into the corners of pots and pans where a round spoon cannot reach. If you have ever tried to stir a thick gravy in a saucepan with a round spoon and felt it missing the edges, a corner spoon solves that problem. It is especially useful when you are making How to Make Perfect Gravy: Every Type and you need to stir every bit of the bottom so nothing scorches.
I keep at least one of each shape, and I reach for different ones depending on what I am making. Over time you will develop your own favorites, and that is part of the pleasure of cooking with wood.
Passing Them Down
There is something about a wooden spoon that has been used for twenty, thirty, forty years that you cannot buy new. The handle wears smooth and fits your grip like it was carved just for you. The color deepens to a rich honey or dark amber. The whole thing just feels right in a way that a brand-new spoon from the store never does.
The same is true for a cutting board that has been oiled and cared for over the years. It develops a warmth and a depth of color that tells you it has been part of real life — real meals, real holidays, real gatherings. It carries the history of your kitchen in its surface.
I still have a wooden spoon that belonged to my mother. The handle is darker than any of my others, worn to a shape that fits a hand that is not quite the same as mine, and the bowl has a curve from years of stirring in her favorite pot. I do not use it every day, but when I do, it connects me to her kitchen in a way that nothing else can. That is not sentimentality. That is the nature of a tool that has been used with care for a long time.
These are not throwaway items. A wooden spoon that costs three or four dollars, taken care of properly, will outlast a twenty-dollar silicone set that will melt the first time it gets left too close to a burner. A good cutting board, oiled regularly and kept dry, will be in your kitchen for decades. These are the tools that were in every Southern kitchen before there were gadgets and gimmicks, and they are still here because they still work.
Take care of them. Wash them by hand, dry them right away, oil them when they look dry, and they will take care of you right back. That is the deal with good tools — you put in a little, and they give you back a lot. It has always been that way in my kitchen, and it will be that way in yours too.
