Season 1 · Stop 5 of 10 · The Woodcutter’s Camp · Apprentice level: Prep Cook · New friend: Spike the hedgehog
Two bends below the mill, in a clearing that smells of sawdust and pine, lives Spike the hedgehog. Spike makes cutting boards. Spike also makes it very clear that nobody touches the cutting boards.
Now, a beaver is, professionally speaking, a wood expert. So when Spike laid out a row of brand-new boards for Chef Tamás to choose from, I inspected each one very closely. Very closely. Closely enough that one of them ended up with a small half-moon bite out of the corner.
Every one of Spike’s spines stood straight up.
“Quality control,” I explained.
Chef Tamás paid for the bitten board, which I thought was very generous, and then he gave Pippa and me a lesson right there on the stump. He put a board down and pushed it. It slid. He laid a damp towel under it and pushed again. It didn’t move an inch.
“Three things,” he said. “It must not slip. It must be kind to your knife. And it must be big. Bigger than you think you need.” Then he looked at me. “And apprentices do not taste the equipment.”
Spike has since forgiven me. Mostly. He still counts his boards when I visit.
Chef Tamás’s real lesson: His kitchen uses both color-coded plastic boards and wooden boards, and each has a job: plastic for hygiene and the dishwasher, wood to be kind to the knife. If you only have room for one board at home, get one big wooden board. And put a damp towel under it.
🎒 Gear from this adventure
- Teakhaus Edge Grain XL: ATK’s wood board winner, 18 × 24 in (about $155)
- Winco Statik Board 15″ × 20″: ATK’s plastic board winner, stays flat in the dishwasher (about $25)
- OXO Good Grips Carving and Cutting Board: the lightweight pick with a juice groove (about $25)
The full, sourced guide: Best cutting boards: wood vs plastic. Prices checked October 2026. Affiliate links: how we make money.
Gerzsi and his friends are made up. Chef Tamás and his lessons are real.
