I always wondered whether the wooden spatulas and spoons they sell at IKEA are safe to use. I never know what that wood was treated with or coated with.
Several people are involved in making every product at IKEA. At least one of them must be an expert in compliance. They can expect scrutiny and product recalls, fines and bad sales if they’re found out.
The one person making the hand-made spoon does not necessarily know all the environmental regulations that should be followed.
A friend who is a potter saw me drinking out of it and said that the glaze looked suspicious. He said it looked loaded with heavy metals, and that I should probably not use it or at least get it tested.
At the time I knew a guy who worked in a lab that tested certain substances for hazardous materials. He was intrigued and brought it in to work one day, and later texted me asking if I wanted it back, because it was very likely leaching cobalt, lead, and cadmium, and it was probably also very mildly radioactive.
I feel much better drinking out of mugs from IKEA and other big name stores.
I get solid wood (olive wood or other woods ) tools and I don’t finish them. But if I did I might just use beeswax
These are strips glued together aka laminated. The binder is not PVA (which is water soluble and not suitable for the task), it’s most commonly a formaldehyde resin such as phenol- , urea- or melamine urea formaldehyde
I don’t build cutting boards myself, but have never heard of using anything but food-safe PVA glue. Those resins are used for laminating plywood etc, probably not even legal to use in kitchen utensils, at least in the EU.
Under temperature, sure, they differ a bunch. But in terms of food prep, no, they are all non-toxic and edible once cured.