Not all charcuterie boards have to be completely blemish-free wood – if you have a gorgeous piece of wood and some epoxy, you can still make a food-safe epoxy coated charcuterie board to use and display.
Well hello there! How the heck are ya’?
I am in my element guys; cooler Fall weather, pie season, cool nights with the windows open….
This is my heaven!
On top of that, I’ve just finished up the last details on my home office built-ins! I was down to painting the office so that the light blue walls didn’t clash with the hale navy built-ins, and then a few minor touch-ups.
DONE!!
It’s drying behind me as I type!
More on that another day – but for today I’m going to go back a couple of months and remind you about the charcuterie boards I made from what was essentially firewood.
I sold a few, and kept a few, but that wasn’t all of the wood that I was working with.
There were also pieces that had cracks and/or holes in them.
You couldn’t serve food on these because you can’t get them clean – in the cracks I mean – so bacteria would accumulate.
But the wood was SO PRETTY!
So I did a little playing to see if my idea would turn out…
Per my charcuterie board tutorial here I cut, sanded and used a router to round over the edges of these ‘damaged’ boards. Instead of coating them with a food grade butcher’s block oil, I coated them in Total Boat epoxy.
If you try this, you’ll definitely want to lay down some plastic to protect your work surfaces. Once epoxy is on, it never comes off.
You’ll also want to place your boards on top of scrap wood pieces that are SMALLER than the charcuterie boards themselves.
I know all of this because I spilled some epoxy on my workbench and I now have a permanent water-looking spot, and because I used scrap wood that was the same size as my boards and they stuck together. 🤦🏻♀️
Oh yeah, I don’t do anything the easy way folks.
For the two boards on top I just poured a small river of epoxy into the cracks and crevices that needed filling.
The bottom board I decided to try because I wanted to see if I could make a ‘live edge’ charcuterie board – and the only way to keep bark on a piece of wood is to adhere it somehow or it will slough off over time.
Look at that shine!
The epoxy did yellow the wood, which epoxy does, so it’s a bit darker than I was hoping for – but hey, all of these were experimental right?
Once the epoxy was completely dry, I sanded the sides and bottom of the epoxied charcuterie boards to remove the extra ‘drools’ that had run under the board.
Imagine this come Christmas with cookies or cocoa on it? I might even add little legs and turn it into a small display stand? Oh! With bottle brush trees and twinkle lights reflecting in the shine!
Yesssss!
The back side was oiled with a food grade butcher block oil and can be used as a charcuterie board as well (this epoxy coated charcuterie board didn’t have cracks).
BEE-U-T-FUL!
But the next one is my favourite:
I’m not sure what wood this is, but it has so much movement and interest – I love it so much!
I added handles to either end so that it’s more like a tray than a charcuterie board.
Small enough to for a full hot cocoa bar (I only put a few things out so you could still see the wood, but it will hold a lot more), large enough for snacks for two.
The bottom/back of this epoxied charcuterie board was sanded down to remove epoxy drools and the screws for the handles were counter-sunk.
It just so happens that this board is the perfect compliment to my office colours, so I decided to display it on a plate stand.
These epoxy coated charcuterie boards didn’t turn out too badly eh?
Especially considering this was just an experiment to see how/if they’d turn out.
Yup, one more win in the DIY decor category!
Take that HomeSense/HomeGoods!
Have a great one!