Pediatrician told us to cut the microplastics in my daughter’s food. Then I looked at the cutting board I prep 20 meals a week on.
At my daughter’s 2-year check-up the pediatrician went through a list of easy swaps: no heating food in plastic, ditch the plastic sippy cups, and “look at what you chop on.”
I came home and actually looked. This is the board I’ve done every Sunday prep on for four years. Every meal she eats went across it. Those white curls down in the grooves are plastic. The grey lines are plastic that’s already gone.
I feel a bit sick about it honestly. What are you all chopping on? I don’t want to buy the wrong thing twice.
I have the exact same Costco board. Just went and tilted it under the light and yep. Same curls. Four years of my kids’ lunches. Following this.
There’s an actual study on this. North Dakota State University, 2023, Environmental Science & Technology. They chopped on plastic boards the way a normal person does and counted what ended up in the food: up to 79 million microplastic particles a year from one board, as much as 50 grams of plastic. The bit that got me is that washing doesn’t fix anything, the next cut shaves off more.
Don’t do what I did. Switched to a glass board because “nothing comes off glass.” True, but it took the edge off a $140 knife in about a month and the knife slides on it. Threw out the glass, kept the dull knife.
We went wood for the same reason, three kids here. Lasted about a year, then a dark line showed up along the middle seam. Googled it. It’s mould in the glue joint. Wood is porous so raw chicken juice goes into the grain, and you can’t put it in the dishwasher. Back to square one.
Nurse here, not a doctor, so take this as one person’s read. Microplastics have now been found in human blood, in placentas and in breast milk. Nobody knows yet what dose matters. What I tell friends is: you can’t control the ocean, but the cutting board is the one source in your kitchen you can remove in a day. Your pediatrician gave you good advice.
Bamboo cracked in half in my dishwasher after two months. Also bamboo boards are glued strips so same problem as Dana. Please someone say there’s a board that just works.
Titanium. I’ve been on one since March and I do a full Sunday prep for two adults and two teenagers. It’s solid metal, so there’s nothing to shed and nothing can soak in. Chicken juice rinses off under the tap, beets don’t stain it, dishwasher every week, still no marks on it. And it doesn’t wreck knives the way glass does, because titanium is softer than the steel in the blade. Mine’s double-sided so raw meat gets one face and veg gets the other.
@Marcus which one? I searched and half of them look identical and some reviews say they’re actually steel.
@Priya a lot of them ARE steel with a grey finish, that’s the trick. Real titanium is about 40% lighter than steel, a 15x10 board should be around 1.3 lb. If it feels heavy it’s steel and it’ll rust and dull your knives. Mine is the Kiru. It’s solid titanium and they do a 60-day money-back, so weigh it when it arrives. This is the one.
OK, three Sunday preps on the Kiru board and I owe this thread an update. I ordered the one Marcus linked and weighed it like he said: 1.3 lb, lighter than my old plastic one.
- Sixty chicken breasts across three Sundays. Not one knife mark on it. Nothing to tilt under the light.
- Raw chicken on one side, her cucumber and fruit on the other. The juice stays in the groove instead of running onto my counter.
- Beets and turmeric rice: rinsed straight off. My old board was orange for life.
- Goes in the dishwasher with the containers. Came out flat and clean, no smell the next day.
- My knife is still sharp. The glass board people warned me about would have ruined it by now.
And the main reason. This is what three weeks of her meals look like coming off a board with nothing to shed into them.
For everyone messaging me “which one”: it’s the Kiru titanium board. Solid titanium, double-sided, 60-day money-back. Two or three boards works out less each if you’re doing meat and veg prep at the same time like me.
They’ve got an early Black Friday deal on at the moment: $49.00 down from $98.00.
Here’s The One I Got →Free US shipping · 60-day money-back guarantee
Ordered two after your update, one for meat one for the kids’ fruit. Thank you for coming back to this thread, most people don’t.