Five Ways to Keep Your Cutting Board from Slipping

Doing any kind of preserving means a lot of time at the cutting board — chopping tomatoes for sauce, strawberries for jam, cabbage for sauerkraut. But even if you’re just prepping dinner, a cutting board that slips around as you chop is risky business. Here are five easy ways to make that cutting board slip-proof and keep your fingertips safe!

1. A Damp Kitchen Towel: Get the towel wet and then wring out as much water as possible. Lay it under your cutting board to create traction between the board and the counter. Thin, cotton towels work best for this; thicker towels are too spongy and can make the board rock while you’re chopping.

2. A Damp Paper Towel: Same idea as the damp kitchen towel and handy in a pinch when cooking in someone else’s kitchen or on vacation.

3. Non-Slip Mats: If it can keep the tools and equipment in our drawers from slipping around, it can do the same for our cutting boards! This is actually the method that I use most often — I have a piece of non-slip mat that I cut down to the size of my cutting board and keep it with my other kitchen supplies.

4. Poster Putty: You know that putty we’ve all used at one time or another to hang posters without thumb tacks? That same stuff can be used to keep cutting boards from slipping! Just put a little ball of putty beneath each corner of your cutting board. (This works best with stiff, heavy boards.)

5. Non-Slip Grips: You can buy small, round, rubber grips at almost any hardware store. One side is an adhesive, so you can stick them to the bottom of your board to keep it from slipping. This is a slightly more permanent solution if you get tired of dealing with slipping every time you pull out your cutting board!

How do you keep your cutting board from slipping?

This post has been updated. Originally published 7/09/09.

(Image: Danielle Tsi)