Bevel & Bond End-Grain Maple Cutting Board Review and Rating

With juice grooves, dugout handles and non-slip feet, the Bevel & Bond End-Grain Maple Cutting Board makes a fine addition to your kitchen.

I keep two types of cutting boards in my kitchen: wood and plastic. A large end-grain maple wood board, 20 x 16 and 2 inches thick, sits on my countertop permanently, right next to the stove. I use it daily for chopping, slicing, and dicing—mostly vegetables, herbs, aromatics, nuts and other ingredients from the plant kingdom.

In a lower cabinet, I keep a few plastic cutting boards for prepping raw meats and fish. And then I have my “nicer” boards for cheese and charcuterie, and a couple for carving and serving roasts, steaks, and fish.

Construction

The Bevel & Bond End-Grain Maple Cutting Board falls into that latter category. It’s generously sized at 17 L x 13 W x 1.75 inches thick, and weighs just over 10 pounds. Bevel & Bond uses U.S.-grown hard maple, which is high-density wood with a tight grain structure, giving the board a good balance of durability and knife-friendliness.

A juice groove lines the top side of the perimeter. The groove is 1/2-inch wide and 1/4-inch deep, enough to accommodate the juices from steaks and smaller roasts, but maybe not quite enough for a big, juicy turkey that’s been carved on the board and sitting there for an hour or two on Thanksgiving day.

Even though it weighs 10 pounds, the short sides have dugout handles, making it easy to carry around. It also comes with non-slip rubber feet affixed to the bottom, flat side (no juice groove there). Alas, those rubber feet prevent the board, strictly speaking, from being reversible. The little rubber feet can get in the way of chopping and scraping ingredients along that surface. But the feet are small (3/8-inch diameter). I suppose you could work around them. Personally, I prefer a completely flat surface for chopping and scraping with ease, especially when the other side of the board has a juice groove, where chopped ingredients tend to get stubbornly caught, like invaders in the moat of a castle.

To keep the board from slipping, I just put a damp cloth underneath.

What is an end grain cutting board?

Most wood cutting boards are constructed with the wood pieces glued together side by side, or with the wood pieces up on their ends. “Edge grain” means the wood pieces are side by side, which positions the wood fibers horizontally on the board. On that type of board, you typically see long uninterrupted “stripes” of wood along the full length of the board. When your knife blade hits the wood on these boards, it cuts across those wood fibers, which gouges the wood more easily, creating crevices where bacteria can hide, and causing the board to wear out a bit sooner.

End grain is preferred among cutting board connoisseurs. On these boards, the wood fibers stand vertically. Instead of uninterrupted stripes along the length of the board, you typically see several shorter “ends” of wood glued together along the board’s length (see photo). When your blade hits an end-grain board, it meets the ends of the wood fibers, so the wood scars less and the board tends to last longer. End-grain boards are easier on knife blades and hide knife marks remarkably well.

Testing the Bevel & Bond End-Grain Maple Cutting Board

I prepped some veg on the smooth side of the board, diced up some onions, sliced some celery, chopped some carrots, minced some garlic and herbs. I tried not to let the rubber feet bother me.

I used the board to prep and cook a few dinners, including a Steakhouse Steak with a simple Board Sauce of butter, coarsely ground black pepper, Meathead’s Red Meat Rub, and some minced herbs from my garden. This board made a beautiful presentation of the steaks at the table. I sliced the meat tableside because I like to wield my shiny, sharp steel knives. What a show off.

On this cutting board, the knife feel and the way the wood absorbs the blade, feels similar to my other end-grain maple cutting boards…smooth and effortless. I’ve become so enamored of hard maple for cutting boards that I ditched all my cheap bamboo boards.

Conclusion

The Bevel & Bond End-Grain Maple Cutting Board comes very nicely packaged in a stylish black box, making it a great gift option for the aspiring chef in your life. It’s not cheap at $139.99. But that’s on par with other high-end cutting boards—and shipping is free. Bevel & Bond also provides a generous 5-year warranty against manufacturing defects, including the glue joints, warping, and structural faults in the wood or construction. The warranty does not cover your own stupidity, including split glue joints caused by your partner washing the board, then leaving it to stand on end in a wet sink. I speak from experience.

We thank Bevel & Bond for providing a cutting board for testing and review.