iBlock by Brooklyn Butcher Blocks
Craftsmanship meets tech-centric lifestyle with this cutting board that holds your tablet
For those spontaneous meals that involve browsing a new recipe from the internet, the task of balancing your tablet can become cumbersome—especially when your focus needs to be on that sizzling frying pan or boiling pot of stock. Nils Wessell of Brooklyn Butcher Blocks used his woodworking skills to come up with a simple yet shrewd solution that also saves space: adding a slot for a tablet to his high-quality, handmade, wooden cutting boards. The chopping block is also reversible, which can save a wash or two during the cooking process.
It doesn’t get more American than Wessell’s production process. He buys the wood from Pennsylvania and Ohio, mills it in his Brooklyn shop, uses food-safe glue manufactured in Ohio and treats his boards with mineral oil made in Texas. And the advantages of going natural are clear: “A plastic cutting board is pretty basic; you cut into the plastic, thus cutting both your food and the board. This means your knife becomes dull and now you have a groove in your board in which bacteria can reside,” explains Nils Wessell. “[This isn’t] the case with an end grain cutting board. By reorienting the woodgrain vertically, you actually cut between the wood fibers as opposed to across them. This means your knife is cutting through virtually nothing and that your board takes much less abuse.” And, with Wessell’s design of the iPad slot, he adds more functions to an already stunning, essential kitchen tool.
iBlocks start at $150 in a selection of wood and grain options, available from the Brooklyn Butcher Blocks website. Slots can be customized for different types of tablets and for a short period of time through 23 April 2014, Brooklyn Butcher Blocks is offering 20% off non-custom orders over $20 with the discount code LUDWIG. For those who already own a wooden cutting board, check out Wessell’s helpful post about caring for it.
Images courtesy of Brooklyn Butcher Block
