i have a end grain wooden cutting board that has been "maintained" with olive oil not by me

[r0bz]

I have an end grain wooden cutting board that has been "maintained" with olive oil for a long time not by me to "protect it" and what happened is that the olive oil oxidated and is smelly and sticky and the cutting board is soaked with it

is there any way to revive it or it needs to go to the trash?

 

[gentiscid]

Wash it down quick with warm water and dish soap, quick scrub. Rinse well. Tap dry with kitchen cloth, let completely air dry standing and rub with a mineral oil/beeswax blend wood conditioning blend.

 

[captaincaed]

replace. That oil will never really come out. Cutting boards aren’t that expensive in the grand scheme.

 

[r0bz]

Wash it down quick with warm water and dish soap, quick scrub. Rinse well. Tap dry with kitchen cloth, let completely air dry standing and rub with a mineral oil/beeswax blend wood conditioning blend.

it is not on the top its soaked inside it i tried that and it does not work the board stays sticky from the oxidized olive oil

 

[iljkaersuoasgr]

How thick is the board and do you have access to any woodworking equipment? Nuclear option would be to plane the board down until you hit fresh wood.

 

[MarcelNL]

if the board was seriously soaked you'll plane right through it ;-) and you'll pull fibers out of the end grain in the process if it would work....

I'd try a wash and thorough scrape and see how it smells, or forego the process and buy a new one.

 

[r0bz]

How thick is the board and do you have access to any woodworking equipment? Nuclear option would be to plane the board down until you hit fresh wood.

i do not have a wood plane unfortunately

 

[r0bz]

'd try a wash and thorough scrape and see how it smells

did that with a glass window scraper and sanded it still sticky and smells like oxidated oil

 

[r0bz]

everytime i tried to wash it new sticky oil comes out to the surface

 

[MarcelNL]

It'll probably burn quite well....

 

[daddy yo yo]

It'll probably burn quite well....

I had the same thought…

 

[ptolemy]

Whoever maintained it with the olive oil, needs a swift kick in the rear end! But yes, it'll make a nice candle

 

[miggus]

I have to say that sometimes I'm lazy and use [EDIT: walnut or linseed] oil on wooden tools. There is a bit of smell, but it isn't too bad if you wipe it afterwards. Certainly not ideal, but I'm surprised that it got so bad in your case. Is the board a really nice piece of gear or does it hold significant value for you? If not, maybe save your time and find a nice fire for it.
If yes, I'd try fat solvents: Alcohol, or even paint thinner - stuff that will evaporate without leaving a trace. I'd assume that if you find the right stuff, it will pull out enough oils. Stuff thats deep in the wood shouldn't be a big problem, if you can seal it with a neutral oil/wax, it shouldn't be smelly / sticky anymore.

 

[HumbleHomeCook]

I have to say that sometimes I'm lazy and use olive oil on wooden tools. There is a bit of smell, but it isn't too bad if you wipe it afterwards. Certainly not ideal, but I'm surprised that it got so bad in your case. Is the board a really nice piece of gear or does it hold significant value for you? If not, maybe save your time and find a nice fire for it.
If yes, I'd try fat solvents: Alcohol, or even paint thinner - stuff that will evaporate without leaving a trace. I'd assume that if you find the right stuff, it will pull out enough oils. Stuff thats deep in the wood shouldn't be a big problem, if you can seal it with a neutral oil/wax, it shouldn't be smelly / sticky anymore.

Keep a bottle of laxative-grade mineral oil next to your work station and you won't have to worry about it any more. No more effort than the olive oil if it is right there at hand.

Maintaining wood with cooking oil is nasty.

 

[miggus]

I agree, it's ideal to use oil without mucilage (is that the word? I mean stuff that can go rancid). But I have to point out two things:
1. As long as I took off any excess soon enough (after 15-20mins), it wasn't all too bad. It's when you don't do that and leave on the oil that doesn't get absorbed is when the oil becomes sticky and then it's really a mess.
2. I edited my original post, because I used linseed or walnut oil. These do polymerize (again, not sure if that is the right term), meaning they harden to a certain degree.

Still - no question that it is much better to use oil that's right for the job from the start. I just mean to say that you can use some other oil in a pinch and it doesn't have to be all too bad.

I'm pretty sure @r0bz' board can be salvaged, the question is if they are willing to invest the effort. Maybe we can see a picture of said board?

 

[r0bz]

Keep a bottle of laxative-grade mineral oil next to your work station and you won't have to worry about it any more. No more effort than the olive oil if it is right there at hand.

Maintaining wood with cooking oil is nasty.

as i have wrote at the top i did not use the olive oil on the board...
i know that white mineral oil for cutting boards must be used....
the problem is that the board is soaked with the oxidized olive oil ...

 

[Delat]

I have to say that sometimes I'm lazy and use olive oil on wooden tools. There is a bit of smell, but it isn't too bad if you wipe it afterwards. Certainly not ideal, but I'm surprised that it got so bad in your case. Is the board a really nice piece of gear or does it hold significant value for you? If not, maybe save your time and find a nice fire for it.
If yes, I'd try fat solvents: Alcohol, or even paint thinner - stuff that will evaporate without leaving a trace. I'd assume that if you find the right stuff, it will pull out enough oils. Stuff thats deep in the wood shouldn't be a big problem, if you can seal it with a neutral oil/wax, it shouldn't be smelly / sticky anymore.

Standard vegetable oils go rancid eventually, it’s as inevitable as patina on a carbon blade. If you’re just quickly treating the surface of side grain it’s probably not an issue as the oil wouldn’t soak in very deep. With end grain and a long soak though, the oil goes quite deep.

Solvents don’t work when the oil is deep in the wood. As you remove oil from the surface, osmosis pulls oil from deeper inside back to the surface (the reverse of what pulled the oil down deep in the first place). I guess you could spend months wiping down the surface and that would eventually suck the oil out, but seems like way more trouble that it’s worth and it would probably still be smelly from oil residue inside.

For the OP, I don’t think there’s anyway to salvage the board from what you describe.

 

[r0bz]

Standard vegetable oils go rancid eventually, it’s as inevitable as patina on a carbon blade. If you’re just quickly treating the surface of side grain it’s probably not an issue as the oil wouldn’t soak in very deep. With end grain and a long soak though, the oil goes quite deep.

Solvents don’t work when the oil is deep in the wood. As you remove oil from the surface, osmosis pulls oil from deeper inside back to the surface (the reverse of what pulled the oil down deep in the first place). I guess you could spend months wiping down the surface and that would eventually suck the oil out, but seems like way more trouble that it’s worth and it would probably still be smelly from oil residue inside.

For the OP, I don’t think there’s anyway to salvage the board from what you describe.

thank you

 

[HumbleHomeCook]

as i have wrote at the top i did not use the olive oil on the board...
i know that white mineral oil for cutting boards must be used....
the problem is that the board is soaked with the oxidized olive oil ...

I wasn't talking to you.

 

[r0bz]

I wasn't talking to you.

 

[captaincaed]

Unfortunately time to start again. But now you have fire wood

 

[Jovidah]

Worth giving a shot IMO is classical solutions like salt, lemon and bleach. If the alternative is throwing it away you could even consider throwing it in a dishwasher; you don't have that much to lose by the sound of it.

Keep a bottle of laxative-grade mineral oil next to your work station and you won't have to worry about it any more. No more effort than the olive oil if it is right there at hand.

Maintaining wood with cooking oil is nasty.

To be fair... I'm actually thinking of switching away from mineral oil... Ikea actually stopped selling it because they couldn't get health inspectors to sign off on the mineral oil anymore... and given how some of it unavoidably ends up in your food I think replacing some boards in the long term might be preferable to eating laxative.
Seems like enough people swear by using things like grapeseed oil that it can't be all that bad. Even some cutting board manufacturers sell it.

 

[HumbleHomeCook]

Worth giving a shot IMO is classical solutions like salt, lemon and bleach. If the alternative is throwing it away you could even consider throwing it in a dishwasher; you don't have that much to lose by the sound of it.

To be fair... I'm actually thinking of switching away from mineral oil... Ikea actually stopped selling it because they couldn't get health inspectors to sign off on the mineral oil anymore... and given how some of it unavoidably ends up in your food I think replacing some boards in the long term might be preferable to eating laxative.
Seems like enough people swear by using things like grapeseed oil that it can't be all that bad. Even some cutting board manufacturers sell it.

To each their own. All my grandparents used it on everything and they all lived long lives and none of them died of digestive issues.

 

[captaincaed]

Dishwasher will explode the board. Grape seed oil will go rancid.

 

[miggus]

There's a lot of food safe options by now. For example, Uulki oil is modified coconut oil with some lemon aroma added to it. There's many options like this available, so there is no need to use mineral oil to begin with. And these oils certainly don't go rancid - I had an almost empty bottle standing around for a few years, still smelling fresh.

Solvents don’t work when the oil is deep in the wood. As you remove oil from the surface, osmosis pulls oil from deeper inside back to the surface

If you say so - I haven't tried this kind of thing, so I have no experience. I just know that my boards are well saturated, but yet the surface "dries out" after washing them 10 or 20 times. In that case, no oil from the deep is pulled up, I have to apply a bit new oil, otherwise the board will start absorbing food juices. So I assumed something like this could be forced with a more powerful solvent than my warm soapy water - still worth a try imho since it won't cost much in money or effort.

But sure, it might not work... Probably depends on a lot of things.

 

[captaincaed]

Any plant or animal derived oil will go rancid, harden, or change in an undesirable way. Full stop.
It often takes some oxygen light and water, but it goes off.
Mineral oil from the pharmacy is inert.

 

[Jovidah]

To each their own. All my grandparents used it on everything and they all lived long lives and none of them died of digestive issues.

Well both my smoking parents haven't died of lung cancer either but that still doesn't make their anecdotal behavior best practise.
I get your point, mineral oil is used in a lot of places... but since I'm already suffering from IBS I don't exactly feel like adding more laxative into my diet.
And I'm genuinely curious how many people actually experienced a board going bad versus how many people used certain vegetable oils without problems. You'll run into plenty of anecdotal people who swear by it when you dive into the topic, and I've seen some manufacturers here actually sell grapeseed oil as cutting board oil. Not saying I have the answers but I'm willing to take the chance.

 

[Cliffkol]

Worth giving a shot IMO is classical solutions like salt, lemon and bleach. If the alternative is throwing it away you could even consider throwing it in a dishwasher; you don't have that much to lose by the sound of it.

To be fair... I'm actually thinking of switching away from mineral oil... Ikea actually stopped selling it because they couldn't get health inspectors to sign off on the mineral oil anymore... and given how some of it unavoidably ends up in your food I think replacing some boards in the long term might be preferable to eating laxative.
Seems like enough people swear by using things like grapeseed oil that it can't be all that bad. Even some cutting board manufacturers sell it.

Jovidah, you are not drinking the mineral oil. It is being used as a thin layer to protect wood cutting boards. The amount that actually ends up on food and into your body is so minuscule that it is not measurable. If any!! And probably is cooked, steamed or roasted away anyway. Seriously! Use mineral oil on the wood cutting boards. or beeswax. Or a combination.

 

[dfoulk]

If it were my board I don't have a planer so I'd hit it with the electric sander. I'd sand it for a bit and see if I could get past that oil. You can do this repeatedly if you have to until you get down far enough. I think you can get it back to good this way.

 

[M1k3]

Well both my smoking parents haven't died of lung cancer either but that still doesn't make their anecdotal behavior best practise.
I get your point, mineral oil is used in a lot of places... but since I'm already suffering from IBS I don't exactly feel like adding more laxative into my diet.
And I'm genuinely curious how many people actually experienced a board going bad versus how many people used certain vegetable oils without problems. You'll run into plenty of anecdotal people who swear by it when you dive into the topic, and I've seen some manufacturers here actually sell grapeseed oil as cutting board oil. Not saying I have the answers but I'm willing to take the chance.

In your case I would definitely avoid mineral oil.

But point still stands, don't oil your cutting board with anything that'll go rancid. Plain beeswax would be better than oil going rancid. Even though it'd be a struggle to spread out.