Hickory: One of the Top Ten Hardwoods for End Grain Butcher Block Cutting Boards
Hickory is almost the same color as the hard maple, but when you oil it, the grain becomes more visible so that after oiling you can really tell the difference. The Hickory will sometimes look like tiger stripes in an end grain cutting board.
Can you tell which wood is Hickory in this board?
Hickory is a Food Safe Wood
Hickory can be used for woodworking projects that will be used for foods, such as bowls, wooden spoons, and End Grain Butcher Block Cutting Boards.
Hickory is a tough wood to machine
but the hardness and toughness make it perfect for cutting boards!
Hickory requires a very sharp tool - carbides are often used. A prettier finish can be obtained, however, by using a high speed cutting tool with a heat reflective coating.
Hickory is so durable and strong that it was used to make the mallets that helped pound the copper to form this Squid Scupture that hangs in the heart of Seattle's Pike Place Market.
Photo Credit: Flickr: cliff1066's Photostream
Pecan VS Hickory Wood
Are they the same or different? Depends on who you ask.
The difficulty for the woodworker is that you can't tell which species of tree your lumber comes from without a chemical or microscopic test. If you are turning drumsticks, for example, you want only a hard dense hickory wood instead of a pecan for the sound quality. Pecan doesn't have the same ring as a hickory stick, producing more of a "thud" than a clear ring tone.
A true hickory wood will be denser and tougher and harder than a pecan, despite the appearance. This can be a trouble spot for a machining project, as strength and machining are very sensitive to density--10% less dense can mean more than 20% weaker. One more reason Hickory is great for End Grain Butcher Block Cutting Boards like those made at Kleppin's Wooden Kitchen, but not suitable at all for a beginner's woodworking project.
Many Trees are called Hickory
Not all Hickory Nuts are Edible
Photo Credit: North American Insects, Spiders & Trees Catalog
Hickory Nut Pie?
Hickory and Pecan are related, but while all pecans are edible, many Hickory Nuts are not.
Hickory has many uses, from tools to cooking!
Many forms of Hickory can be found on Amazon
Charbroil Hickory Wood Chips, 2 Pound Bag
Amazon Price: $5.37 (as of 01/01/2010) 
Vaughan CF1 23-Ounce California Framer, Milled Face, Straight White Hickory Handle, 17-Inch Long
You NEED a Hickory Handle Hammer, right? LOL
Amazon Price: $24.88 (as of 01/01/2010)
Bradley Smoker Bisquettes, 48 Pack (Choose Flavor)
Choose Hickory, of course -- BBQ at its best with Hickory Chips.
Amazon Price: (as of 01/01/2010)
Seven Scent Sampler Pack of Incense of the Southwest
MMMMM! I can just imagine how good these seven scents are going to be.
Amazon Price: $13.95 (as of 01/01/2010)
Elliott Yamin
I don't know what connection Elliott Yamin has with Hickory, but he came up in my Amazon search and I just LOVE his voice! Maybe he's smooth as Hickory? He stays 'cause I'm gonna order this CD myself. Hurry and you can get one, too, before I replace it with something woodier!
Amazon Price: $11.98 (as of 01/01/2010)
Hickory is one of the Ten Hardwoods used by Kleppin's Wooden Kitchen
Here are five of the others
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Woodworking with Fishtail Oak
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Strong and durable, Fishtail Oak is a wood of choice for building shipping crates used for heavy equipment and steel ingots, but its distinctive appearance makes it ideal for woodworking projects that will not be painted or stained. The wood has a m...
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Woodworking with Maple
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Maple is one of the most often used hard woods for woodworking because it is abundant, relatively inexpensive, and beautiful. Maple trees provide much more than just lumber, however. Certain types of Maple also provide delicious Maple Syrup. Maple i...
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Woodworking with Bamboo
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Bamboo isn't what most woodworkers think of when they think of working with wood, but it is an amazing natural resource and is tough enough and hard enough to use for a cutting board. Kleppin's Wooden Kitchen uses bamboo as an accent color to add fla...
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Woodworking with Cherry
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Cherry wood, while not an exotic wood, is a lovely accent colored hard wood that is also food safe, and used to manufacture many items. The popularity of black cherry as a furniture and panel wood stems from its beauty and ease of use. It is uniform...
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Woodworking with Walnut
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The top 3 reasons woodworkers love Walnut: It has a fine Grain, it's very resistant to wood rot, and it is highly resilient. Walnut is a fine American hardwood with many uses. At one time, black walnut was the #1 hardwood in use in colonial America,...
Four more of the Top Ten hardwoods used by Kleppin's Wooden Kitchen
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woodworking with Katalox
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Katalox, known botanically as swartzia cubensis and sometimes called "Mexican Ebony" is hard wood with a tight grain. This is an extremely useful wood for many woodworking projects, including bowls and cutting boards. This is one of the 10 hardwoods...
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Woodworking with Monterillo
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Monterillo is considered to be both Exotic and Rare, because the tree seldom grows large enough to produce lumber sized boards. This limits the availability for large projects, but the color and durability are excellent for the end grain butcher bloc...
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Woodworking with Jatoba
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Jatoba, also known as Brazilian Cherry, is an extremely hard and durable wood, which why it's one of the TOP TEN hard woods favored by Bob Kleppin, of Kleppin's Wooden Kitchen, as he hand crafts elegant, one-of-a-kind and amazingly beautiful kitchen...
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Woodworking with Purple Heart
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Purple Heart gets its name from the core of the wood, which begins as a brown colored wood inside a lighter colored outer ring, but which turns purple as it is exposed to air. The color can vary from very dark, deep purple to such a light color that...
Here's my favorite link:
Hickory is often used in the cutting boards made by Kleppin's Wooden Kitchen
End Grain Butcher Block hardwood cutting boards are available on Etsy
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Learn more about Hickory Wood here!
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Hickory Wood: Flooring to Walk On or Wood to Cook With?
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Hickory Wood: Lumber is showing up in all sorts of decorating arenas from kitchen cabinets to hardwood flooring, as consumers strive to create a sense of country living in their home environment. Historically we have considered hickory wood as a utili...
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Amish Wood & Wood Types Information
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When you invest in wood, whether it is furniture, cabinets or something else made of wood, you need information that is relevant. I am building this lens to get you all the information you need to know about wood types, wood care, how things are...
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