End Grain Boards
End-grain or 'butcher block' chopping boards are favoured by professional chefs for their durability and because they are much kinder to knife blades than face-grain or edge-grain boards. In an end-grain board, the wood fibres are perpendicular to the cutting surface (think of a bunch of straws held upright), which means that the knife blade is not continuously slicing the wood fibres as it is drawn across the board. A sharp blade will therefore stay sharp for longer, and the board itself will last for decades as the end-grain swells when cleaned with a damp cloth, effectively healing itself.
