Butcher Block and Wood Countertops

Wood is the only common countertop you can sand down and make new. It is warm to the touch, quiet under a plate and kind to knives and glassware. It also moves with humidity, marks under a hot pan and resents standing water. Those traits make it an excellent choice for part of a kitchen and a demanding one for the whole thing.

Three ways to build a wood top

"Butcher block" is used loosely for any glued-up wood counter. How the pieces are oriented decides how the top looks and wears.

For a working counter, edge grain is the usual answer. End grain suits a dedicated chopping section or a freestanding block. Face grain suits a bar, a desk area or an island used mainly for serving.

Species

Hard maple is the traditional butcher block wood: pale, hard and close-grained, so the surface is smooth and has few open pores. Walnut is softer and chosen for its dark color. Cherry darkens noticeably with light and age. White oak is hard and has a strong grain with open pores that need filling by the finish. Bamboo tops are sold alongside wood; bamboo is a grass, laminated in strips, and is hard and consistent.

Species differ in hardness, color change and how they take finish in the same ways they do in cabinetry. The page on cabinet wood species covers those differences, including measured hardness, so it is not repeated here. If the wood top will sit on wood cabinets, read wood kitchens and natural materials before choosing two species that fight each other.

Finishes: oil, hard-wax oil or film

The finish decides how you will live with the counter more than the species does.

The honest summary: oil is high attention and low stakes, film is low attention and high stakes. An oiled top looks dry and patchy if neglected and is back to new after an hour's work. A film-finished top looks perfect for years, then a cut or a gap at the sink lets water in, the wood turns black beneath the coating and the fix is a full refinish.

Whatever you choose, the underside and every cut edge need finish too. A top sealed only on its face takes up moisture unevenly and cups.

Water at the sink

This is where wood tops fail. Water sits at the faucet base, runs to the sink rim and soaks into the end grain exposed by the cutout. The first sign is a gray or black stain at the rim, followed by raised grain and, in time, open glue joints.

If you want wood around a sink, improve the odds:

• Choose a drop-in or apron-front sink over an undermount, or accept the upkeep an undermount brings.
• Have every surface of the cutout and the faucet holes sealed before the sink goes in.
• Use a deck-mounted faucet with a good gasket, or a wall-mounted faucet that keeps the base off the wood.
• Keep the finish intact and wipe the area dry after washing up.
• Never leave a wet dishcloth, a sponge or a dish rack sitting on the wood.

The dishwasher matters too. Steam released when the door opens rises against the underside and front edge of the counter above it, so that edge needs a sound finish and, ideally, a moisture barrier strip under the top. Sink and faucet choices are covered in sinks, faucets and plumbing.

Sanitation: what the food-safety sources say

Wood is an accepted food-preparation surface. USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service tells consumers they may choose either wood or a nonporous surface for cutting, and notes that nonporous surfaces are easier to clean. Its guidance in short:

• Wash with hot, soapy water after each use, rinse with clear water and air dry or pat dry with clean paper towels.
• Wooden and plastic boards can both be sanitized with 1 tablespoon of unscented liquid chlorine bleach per gallon of water. Flood the surface, let it stand several minutes, rinse and dry.
• Use one board for fresh produce and bread and a separate one for raw meat, poultry and seafood.
• Replace boards that are excessively worn or have hard-to-clean grooves.

The last two points are the useful ones for a countertop. A counter cannot go to the sink and cannot be thrown away, so do the raw-meat work on a separate board and keep the counter for bread, vegetables and pastry. Deep knife scoring in a wood top is a reason to sand it, not only a cosmetic matter.

Commercial kitchens follow the same logic. Washington's retail food code, which adopts the FDA Food Code, generally bars wood as a food-contact surface but allows hard maple or an equivalently hard, close-grained wood for cutting boards, cutting blocks and bakers' tables (WAC 246-215-04130). That rule governs food establishments, not private homes, but it explains why maple is the classic choice.

Using wood on an island only

Most wood counters in remodels are on an island with no sink, or on a section of one. It keeps the wood away from standing water and from the range, breaks up a long run of stone or quartz, and gives the kitchen one warm surface where people sit and lean. A wood island top pairs easily with a harder perimeter material; compare those in quartz versus granite. If the island will have seating, the kitchen islands page gives the overhang and clearance guidelines.

What to check before you buy

• Construction: edge, end or face grain, and whether strips run full length or are finger-jointed from short pieces.
• Thickness, and whether the edge is solid or built up.
• Which finish is on it now, whether it covers the underside, and what the maker says about cutting on it.
• For an unfinished top: who will finish it, with what, and when.
• Maximum length and width available, and where joints will fall on a long run or large island.
• How the installer will fasten it to allow for movement.
• How cutouts will be sealed, if there are any.

Who should choose wood

Good fit: you bake, you want one warm surface in a kitchen of stone and paint, you are happy to oil a counter a few times a year, or you like the idea of sanding out the damage and starting over.

Poor fit: you want a counter you never think about, the wood would surround the main sink in a busy family kitchen, or hot pans regularly land on the counter.

Unfinished butcher block is one of the few countertops a capable homeowner can cut and install, which our article on inexpensive countertops you can install yourself goes through. For the other materials, return to the countertop overview. If a wood island is part of a larger project, JDI Construction plans it with the cabinets and flooring during design; see our Vancouver kitchen remodeling page.