basketmaker – food grade finish (off gas is an issue)
I’m a basket weaver and make mushroom foraging baskets out of a porous “reed”, it sucks up finish like a sponge.
Baskets are workhorses and get wet in the woods, so protecting from mold is an issue. It also needs to be food grade.
I’ve been brushing on a mix of 1/4C part non poly stain, 3/4C odorless mineral spirit & 2T boiled linseed oil –but the linseed oil still has lingering odor more than 6 weeks later. I personally like it but today I had to remove my baskets from a display because some folks complained of headaches.
I’m looking for options, would adding a **urethane top coat seal in the smell? Would the finish still be flexible? What about food grade?
**EDIT I just learned that a varnish makes the basket inflexible and impossible to repair years down the line.
Replies
I've been looking this up lately for a different project and I think I've settled on food grade, pure tung oil. It will 'dry' unlike mineral oil. And it's non-toxic (unlike boiled linseed which contains heavy metals).
Thank you, agree, heavy metals is another issue I had forgotten about. Apparently some people dislike the tung oil smell even more than linseed.
Ever consider Tried and True boiled linseed? supposedly no heavy metals. They claim no VOCs.
I dunno how it could cure if it didn't have VOC. 🤔 Not all VOC are created equal though. Like. A lot of cooking smells are VOC.
Maybe you could try walnut oil? It's another "drying" (curing) oil.
When I was investigating similar (a dish drying rack) I found the best/most relevant advice was found from people looking to oil chopping boards, if that helps! Cause it's food safe.
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You can dissolve wax in mineral oil for an everything safe finish. In a mason jar I shave candlemaking wax with a cheese grater to max out surface area. Swirl it every time you walk by until it dissolves, then add more wax until it won't dissolve... Then put the jar on a radiator and more will dissolve in. Once that's maxed out it's ready to apply.
For a basket I'd put it on heavy, wait an hour, hit it with compressed air to clear the gaps, and buff it with a towel.
interesting, I'll research. Assuming pure beeswax? I'm thinking those spaces will be very difficult to clear even with a compressor. The spaces are tight but the working area is even tighter. But I love this idea, just need to think some on it.
I use paraffin, the white stuff sold for canning foods and making candles... never tried beeswax. Maybe a heat gun along with the compressor? Weave a test panel and let us know what you settle on.
I mix beeswax (from the farmers market) with mineral oil in a mason jar and heat it up on a hotplate until the wax melts. It becomes a yellowish gel the consistency of hand cream. I use that for cutting boards and kitchen tool handles.
I have a question - do you treat the cane or reed before you weave the basket or after it's woven? Im figuring after but could you pre treat the basket material?. Some of the bees wax products made for cutting boards might work for you but they are kind of thick and messy going on and might cause you problems on a woven basket cleaning up. They wont dry out i wouldnt think. Maybe the compressed air that someone mentioned. Burts Bees makes a product. Old Burt seems woke enough to appeal to your Sierra clubbers! I know what your up against. A story got around about the old linoleum in one of our public buildings having asbestos. There are hysteri6cal people now that will not walk across the floor to get their mail! So, is the headache from the smell or worrying about the smell?
Linseed oil in your finish on your exposed to sun and weather thing might tend to darken or even go black and has some food safe problems most likely. Pure tung oil is probably the best for protection and ware and is considered food safe. Someone mentioned walnut oil but is it considered food safe? Lots of toxic things associated with walnuts. If ,as you say ,the reed really sucks it up then maybe you need to let the basket sit for a much longer time to let the oil gas off. Maybe in a ventilated place with a fan blowing. I'd consider just mineral oil, no smell , it wont cause the basket to get brittle but would have to be maintained and reapplied from time to time by the end user.
I can only treat the basket after weaving. I do think that if I'm using an oil it needs to be a drying oil, it's a backpack so I'd hate to get it on clothes.
I did just checked in with some old-timers and they use linseed ranging from 2T linseed all the way on down 1/2T linseed and then some even with no linseed at all (just letting the minwax stain be the protectant). But honestly minwax stain can’t be good for mushrooms…
I'm going to give a go at 1/2T linseed and see how that works. Will prob also do a test weave with just stain and get it wet and let it sit outside for a bit. I'm also adding a note to my invoices saying the scent will dissipate over a couple of weeks/months.
You can add glycerine when you soak the reeds. That's kinda common practice. It makes the reeds more permanently flexible which makes them last longer
Look into hemp oil. It is one of the three drying oils, along with tung and linseed. Tung and linseed have a strong odor that is a common irritant to those with chemical sensitivities (myself included). Hemp oil will take a long time to dry (weeks), but the same is true of raw tung and linseed (without metallic dryers). And if you buy the food grade stuff from the grocery store you can put the leftover on your salad.
Thanks, I'm going to check that out, great idea.
Another good option might be shellac. Fast drying. Not toxic (it’s used as a coating on pharmaceuticals). Look up the articles on FWW about mixing your own. No idea if it would work on a basket.
It chips. It's not very flexible.
I think that the op is correct in that anything that gets hard will lead to the baskets ultimate distruction. I've recaned canoe seats. It's necessary to varnish the seats to protect them from water and the elements but it does make the cane brittle and eventually ( some years ) it will develope cracks and break. Repairing is difficult to impossible and it's just easier to just start over. I don't think that the op needs instruction on how to make a basket.The basket looks well-made. I've never made a basket but I find caning to be tedious and boring, so I am really impressed when someone makes things like that!
I'm not sure that glycerin in the water would make much difference as far as protection goes. I've used glycerin when I've caned chairs. Usually I just use water for the start and will add glycerin when the tension starts making the caning more difficult. When a caned chair gets used for a while the cane stretches some and gets a little sag. The fix for that is to set a damp rag on the seat and when it drys out it tends to tighten up the cane. There seems to be no difference between cane that has been soaked with just water as compared to cane that was done with a glycol solution for that fix. If anything I think the glycol would,if still present ,tend to draw unwanted elements into the cane. PEG is used for that purpose, to draw chemicals or minerals such as borates into things, particularly wood.
I keep most of my finishing supplies in a separate building so that when the fire comes all the bombs are well away from my house or the shop. I found in there a product. Howard's Cutting Board Oil. Says on the bottle " Colorless, odorless and tasteless. " Food grade mineral oil..claims to exceed FDA requirements for direct or indirect food contact.
Long ago I had a little sideline of making some kitchenware items out of cherry that a giftshop catalog store carried. Simple and fast and I made enough out of it to keep the lights on. I used mineral oil only, just straight from the bottle. I still have some examples of those and recently rediscovered them. They were untouched since original, never used of course , but if they were from my last run of them that would have been in 1984. They still looked good! I reapplied some mineral oil on them and they popped! Probably that Howard's stuff.
I've been using Osmo Polyx on pretty much everything except table tops.
Looks, feels and smells fantastic. Natural and totally food safe.
It will mark with heavy dampness though it will provide quite a lot of protection. It's also a doddle to apply and to repair, if a bit expensive.
On wood, I find the smell undetectable after a few days but it's so nice you'd want it to keep smelling that way forever!
Rubio Monocoat is supposed to provide more protection but I've not used that product myself.
You can get test packs of Osmo which should be enough to finish enough reed to give it a test. As with all finish products, test first to avoid regret later.