When
looking for your wooden spoon blanks consider some
of the following:
Function.
If you are creating a spoon that is purely going
to be presented as a sculpture form you should look
for wood that may have an unusual grain, color or
form. One of the most beautiful spoons that I’ve
seen was made from the Douglas Fir joists of an
old barn that used the gray, aged exterior of the
wood as a decorative surface and had the bowl of
the spoon carved away to expose the new, bright
high contrast grain inside.
Spoons
that are going straight into the kitchen or onto
the dining room table have other considerations
to keep in mind. More dense hardwoods such as the
Birch family, Apple, Pear, and Maple make great
general use kitchen utensils due to their specific
gravity or weight per cubic inch when dried to a
low moisture content.
Not
all hardwoods are acceptable as kitchenware. Poplars
(Aspen) don’t work well due to the fact that
they are a soft hardwood and Low specific gravity
and won’t take the abuse of everyday use. Oaks,
Ash, and other open grained woods aren’t good
choices due to the fact that the wood grain itself
has open pores that will retain food, fats and oils
and soon turn rancid even after washing.
Form
Choose wood that will be thick enough for your ladle
or deep serving spoon or thin enough to make a butter
paddle without having to carve down a log. Thin
designs will benefit from using hard, dense wood
such as maple or pear.
Pay
attention to grain direction also. Carving a bend
into a straight grained piece of wood will result
in weakness if the structure of your spoon is not
taken into consideration. If you are going to carve
a bend in your design look for a piece of wood that
has grain that will follow that form.
Defects
When looking at your piece of spoon wood, check
for some of the undesirable defects in the wood
such as any discoloration due to spalt, termite
or beetle channels, rotten spots, large open cracks
and checking, and missing knots. No one wants to
see some of these things in the spoon about to serve
the chef salad.
Wood
Grain
There are many different wood grain patterns within
a tree. For example, the lower trunk of a large
maple tree has grain compression that when carved
and finished correctly looks like rippling water.
The wood in a clump of Maples or Birch where the
main trunks start to separate are choice pieces
to carve. They are best carved while the are green
because of the constantly changing grain direction.
Where
to find it
Keep your eyes open. When you start to see pieces
of wood as potential spoons, it’s everywhere.
Most pallets are made from Maple. Go to the fruit
orchards in the fall when orchard growers are pruning
or cleaning old trees out. Blowdowns after a storm,
and clearcuts after a logging operation are opportunities
for great pieces to add to your collection. Let
people know that you are looking for that kind of
wood and reward them with a handmade spoon.
Keep
carving.
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