Is Wood River 100% Tung Oil Food Safe?

[Pat Germain]

I wanted some Tung Oil to finish cutting boards. I was at Woodcraft, saw a bottle of 100% Tung Oil and grabbed it. All other containers of 100% tung oil I have seen say "Food Safe". This Wood River bottle does not. So is it not Food Safe?

Thank you.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

According to a pond liner engineer I have spoken with It is a big ordeal for manufacturers to get food safe qualification. His company stopped going to the trouble and expense of certifying the liners and simply advertises their product as 100% butyl rubber. It maybe the same with Wood River.

[Curt Harms]

Maurice is most likely correct, it's more trouble getting food safe qualification than it's worth for a small scale operator. My only concern would be if the tung oil has some sort of metal dryer in it to speed cure. But then it wouldn't be 100% tung oil would it?

[roger wiegand]

Here's a fairly concise description of FDA compliant, food grade, and food safe coatings. (https://www.industrialspec.com/about-us/blog/detail/fda-compliant-food-grade-food-safe-meanings) I think it would be very rare for a wood finish manufacturer to invest the (millions?) of dollars required to achieve a food grade rating from the FDA. Product so labeled are probably taken from the "GRAS list (https://www.fda.gov/food/food-ingredients-packaging/generally-recognized-safe-gras)" (generally recognized as safe), products that have been in widespread use for a long time, but not necessarily tested for safety. Bees wax, mineral oil, edible nut oils, and shellac are examples. Here is the GRAS listing for tung oil (https://www.cfsanappsexternal.fda.gov/scripts/fdcc/?set=IndirectAdditives&id=TUNGOIL&sort=Sortterm_ID&order=ASC&startrow=1&type=basic&search=tung%20) Note that that listing applies only to the exact form of the product listed, not just anything labeled "tung oil" by someone.

Finally, here is the rule that supports the general assertion that all commonly sold clear finishes in the US are "food safe for contact" once they have dried and cured: https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfCFR/CFRSearch.cfm?fr=175.300

All that said, if you are depending on this designation for a product you mean to sell and want to be as covered as you can be, you need the services of an attorney versed in FDA regulatory compliance to write a legal opinion that the product you are using meets the conditions of the rule. You'd have to sell a lot of cutting boards to make that worthwhile!

[Pat Germain]

Thanks, guys. The cutting boards will be for my own use with a few as gifts for friends and relatives.

I suspected it was a procedural thing. To be sure, I will likely pick up another bottle of tung oil and use the Wood River stuff for a Shaker table I'm building. As I recall I can mix it equally with a varnish and mineral spirits.

[George Yetka]

There are levels of safe. I would use a product on a charcuterie board that I wouldnt use on a cutting board. If brief contact will occur a waxed oil or a tung oil may be fine but if im using it on a spoon that goes in a pot or on a cutting board that will get chopped up Id stick with mineral oil and beeswax. I dont know enough about the rest to risk it.

[Pat Germain]

There are levels of safe. I would use a product on a charcuterie board that I wouldnt use on a cutting board. If brief contact will occur a waxed oil or a tung oil may be fine but if im using it on a spoon that goes in a pot or on a cutting board that will get chopped up Id stick with mineral oil and beeswax. I dont know enough about the rest to risk it.

Most 100% tung oils are in fact food safe. Tung oil also appears to be the most durable cutting board treatment according a recent test by Marc Spagnuolo.