Olive Wood, Bamboo or Acacia: Which Wood for the Kitchen?
Bamboo is cheap, acacia is popular, olive wood costs more. What really sets the three apart in the kitchen, from hardness and hygiene to knives and care.
If you're looking for a wooden cutting board or spoon, you'll almost always end up choosing between three materials: bamboo, acacia and olive wood. At first glance they look similar. In everyday use they differ quite a lot. Here is an honest comparison.
Bamboo: cheap, hard, and not actually wood
Botanically, bamboo is a grass. For boards, thin strips are pressed together into panels with glue. That makes bamboo boards cheap, light and fairly hard. The downside: the hard fibres and their silica content dull knives faster, and a good part of the board is adhesive. Be careful with tableware made of “bamboo fibre”: it's usually a plastic mixed with bamboo powder, which authorities advise against for hot food.
Acacia: the popular middle ground
Acacia is hard, water-resistant and inexpensive, which is why you'll find it in almost every department store. Many acacia boards are made of several glued strips, which you can tell from the stripes. The grain is usually calm and even. A solid everyday wood that lasts a long time with good care.
Olive wood: dense, solid, unmistakable
Olive trees grow very slowly, so their wood is especially dense and hard. It takes on barely any moisture or odours, is taste-neutral and has a lively, flame-like grain that falls differently on every piece. Our boards and spoons are each made from a single piece, with no glue joints. Olive wood costs more because a gnarled trunk yields only a few usable pieces. Why it's worth it is explained in Why olive wood?
The comparison at a glance
- Hardness and durability: olive wood and acacia are very hard and long-lasting; bamboo is hard but can split at the glue joints.
- Kind to knives: olive wood and acacia are knife-friendly; bamboo dulls blades faster.
- Hygiene: dense wood absorbs little moisture, which puts olive wood and acacia ahead.
- Care: none of the three belongs in the dishwasher, and all need oil now and then.
- Looks: bamboo is even and pale, acacia calmly grained, olive wood lively and warm.
- Price: bamboo is the cheapest, acacia sits in the middle, olive wood is the most expensive.
Our verdict
If you want an inexpensive board for everyday use, acacia will serve you well. If you want a piece that lasts for decades, feels good in the hand and looks good on the table, choose olive wood: as a cutting and serving board, as spoons and kitchen tools or as a bowl. And to keep it that way: how to oil olive wood.
