A mincing board is a wooden cutting board used for mincing herbs and other foods such as nuts. Mincing boards have a circular indentation in the middle to help hold the chopped items on the board. A mincing board is usually small and square in shape and made out of hard wood such as maple.
A mincing board may be sold alone, but more often than not it's packaged in a set along with a mincing knife. This is because the mincing knife is designed to fit the indentation area in the board. A mincing knife has a curved blade and one or two handles to help work the blade in a slicing motion over the herbs or nuts to be minced. Some mincing knives have noticeable handles sticking up from above the blade, while others are sleeker in design.
A regular knife and regular cutting board don't usually work as well for mincing herbs as the fine, moist herbs tend to slide off the cutting board, yet stick to the knife. There are doubled-bladed mincing knives available, but some cooks find that the minced herbs tend to collect in between the two blades. A single-bladed mincing knife used with a mincing board often helps to keep the herbs from both sliding off the board and sticking to the knife.
Dicing is cutting foods into fine uniform pieces and mincing is just an even finer dice. It's often much easier to create uniform pieces when dicing herbs on a mincing board by moving the mincing knife up and down the walls of the curved indentation in the board that it is with a regular flat cutting board and straight-bladed knife. The rubber feet on most mincing boards helps keep the board steady.
Some people like to use a mincing board rather than a regular cutting board on camping trips. The smaller size and square shape makes it easy to handle in a small space and the indentation section helps keep foods from falling over the sides as easily. A mincing board and knife set can also make a great gift and many sets are sold in gift boxes and come with a lifetime guarantee.
