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Kaito Mason Spent Three Years Getting a Titanium Cutting Board Right Before He Was Willing to Sell One
Kaito Mason is a materials engineer by training who has been building kitchen tools in his Minneapolis workshop for six years. Three years ago he started experimenting with food-grade titanium as a cutting surface. Last year he finally made a batch he was willing to sell. “I wasn’t going to put my name on it until I knew it was right,” he says. “That took longer than I expected.”
He started with the surface question: does titanium dull knives faster than wood? He built a jig, ran a sharpened blade across titanium, maple, and ceramic at controlled pressure, and measured the edge after fifty passes. Titanium performed between wood and ceramic — harder than wood, significantly softer than ceramic. His chef knives still needed sharpening on the same schedule they always had.
Then the warp question. He soaked boards, ran them through a dishwasher cycle daily for three months, stored them flat, stored them upright, left them wet, left them dry. The titanium didn’t warp. Wood warped. The titanium sat flat after 90 days of deliberate abuse. “I wanted to find the failure mode,” he says. “I didn’t find one.”
The smell question was the one that mattered most to him. Wood absorbs. Titanium doesn’t. He cut onion, garlic, raw fish, and red meat on the same board over a week without washing it, then gave it a single pass under hot water. The smell was gone. “Wood holds odor. It doesn’t matter how many times you wash it. Titanium releases clean.” This, for Kaito, was the design win.
The Testing That Took Three Years
Kaito went through eleven board prototypes before settling on this one. The failures were instructive: the first prototype had corners that would catch a palm during lateral cutting motion. The third had a handle channel that collected water. The seventh had a surface finish that was too aggressive — it cut well but showed knife marks after two months. The current version has a finish he describes as “honest — it shows use, but it shows use the right way.”
“I kept using it as my daily board and finding small things to fix. After the eleventh version I stopped finding things. That’s when I knew it was done.”
He edge-finishes every board by hand. The corners are radiused. The long edges are broken. He runs his thumb along each edge before the board ships — feeling for any point that would catch a palm or raise a question. “If I find something, I fix it. If I can’t fix it, I don’t ship it. That’s the rule.”
The Board You Use Every Day
Kaito uses this board daily in his own kitchen. He has a cherry end-grain board he bought in 2018 that he still uses for bread. He stopped reaching for it for prep work. “The titanium is easier,” he says. “Easier to clean, easier to pick up and move, doesn’t need oil, doesn’t smell. It’s just easier. And it’s flat. It was flat when I made it and it’s flat now.”
The handles — there are recessed grips on the long edges — are designed for single-hand lift with a full board. He tested the grip depth with a range of hand sizes, including his own (large) and his wife’s (small). Both lift cleanly. The board doesn’t rotate in the grip under load. This sounds like a small thing. After a year of daily use, it doesn’t feel small.
Grade 2 food-grade titanium. Not coated. Not clad. The material that touches your food is titanium all the way through. There’s no coating to scratch off, no cladding to separate, no surface treatment that changes over time. What you buy is what it will be in ten years.
What Makes This Cutting Board Different
The cutting surface is titanium all the way through. No coating, no cladding, no surface treatment. The material touching your food is the same material that will be there in ten years. This is the reason it can go in the dishwasher every day without degrading.
Titanium is harder than wood and significantly softer than ceramic. Kaito tested edge retention on his chef knives after fifty passes across titanium vs. his end-grain maple. The titanium required sharpening on the same schedule. For kitchen knives used on a normal prep schedule, this board is not the variable.
Kaito ran boards through a daily dishwasher cycle for 90 days. The titanium didn’t warp. He stored them wet, stored them dry, left them in standing water. Flat before and flat after. Wood is a different story.
Titanium doesn’t absorb odor. Kaito cut onion, garlic, raw fish, and meat on the same board for a week, washed once under hot water, and the smell was gone. Wood holds odor — you can wash it repeatedly and it holds. Titanium releases clean.
Kaito radius-finishes the corners and breaks the long edges by hand. He runs his thumb along every edge before shipping. If it catches, he fixes it. If he can’t fix it cleanly, it doesn’t ship. No board with a catching edge has ever left his workshop.
The Workshop After the Testing
Kaito is back to making tools. He’s working on a chef’s knife with a titanium bolster and a handle material he won’t name yet. He still uses the cutting board every day. “Daily testing,” he calls it, and smiles. He also knows exactly where to find every tiny variation in every board he’s shipped. “That’s the engineer in me. I can’t turn it off.”
The boards ship in a run. Kaito doesn’t make them on demand — he makes them in batches when he has the right material and the time to finish each one correctly. This is the current batch. The next one doesn’t have a date.
Grade 2 food-grade titanium. Dishwasher-safe. Flat after three years of daily use. Hand-edge-finished by the engineer who designed it and uses it himself. If you’ve been through enough warped wood and chipped ceramic — this is the board that ends that story.
Current batch shipping now — next run not scheduled
Choose your pack below. Ships from Minneapolis while supplies last. Free shipping over $75.
See Packs & Availability1 board · 2 boards · 3 boards
What People Are Saying
★★★★★
“I’ve been through four cutting boards in five years — warped walnut, stained bamboo, cracked acacia. This one is none of that. Flat after a month of daily use, dishwasher every time, still looks new. Exactly what I wanted and exactly what the description said.”
★★★★★
“As someone who sharpens my own knives, I was nervous about titanium. I tested my edges before and after two weeks of daily prep on this board. No meaningful difference from my previous end-grain maple. The board is harder but nowhere near ceramic-hard. Kaito clearly tested this before selling it.”
★★★★★
“Gift for my husband who is obsessive about his kitchen setup. He didn’t say much when he opened it. He just started using it. Two months later he hasn’t reached for his old board once. That’s the review. When a kitchen person switches boards without commentary, the board won.”
A Few Questions Before You Choose
Will this board damage my knives?
Grade 2 titanium is harder than wood and significantly softer than ceramic. Kaito tested edge retention on chef knives after fifty controlled passes across titanium vs. end-grain maple. The titanium required sharpening on the same schedule. For normal kitchen prep use, this board is not the variable in your knife-edge equation. If you sharpen your knives regularly on any board, you’ll sharpen them on the same schedule on this one.
Can it really go in the dishwasher?
Yes, every time. Kaito ran boards through a daily dishwasher cycle for 90 days during testing. No warping, no surface degradation, no change in edge grip. The board that went in on day one looked like the board that came out on day 90. The titanium isn’t coated — there’s nothing to strip or degrade.
When is the next run?
Kaito makes boards in batches when he has the right material and the finishing time. The next batch doesn’t have a scheduled date. This is the current run. If you want one, now is the right time.
Grade 2 titanium · current batch · next run not scheduled
See what’s available in this run.
See Packs & AvailabilityShips from Minneapolis while supplies last.