How to Care for Your Feinback Products

At Feinback, we create baking tools that honour tradition, sustainability, and the joy of sharing bread with those you love. Each product is designed to last—crafted from natural, certified, and responsibly sourced materials.

1. Olive Wood Bread Knife

Our knife combines a precision stainless-steel blade, hardened to approximately 60 HRC, with a natural olive wood handle. With proper care, both are designed to provide years of service.

Choose Your Cutting Board Carefully

Your cutting surface has a significant effect on knife longevity.

Caring for your Feinbäck Olive Wood Bread Knife is essential to ensure its longevity. Naturally knives dull through use, to ensure your blade stays sharp longer, please use one of our recommended cutting boards.

Recommended Cutting Boards

Best: End grain. Wood fibres yield to the blade, preserving the serrated teeth. Maple, walnut, cherry, beech wood are excellent.

Excellent: Maple, walnut, cherry, beech wood. Soft enough to absorb impact but dense enough to resist deep gouges.

Avoid: Oak, pine, cedar, rosewood, plastic. Bamboo and composite wood contain materials that will accelerate dulling the knife.

Never: Glass, ceramic, stone, metal. Immediately destroys teeth and voids warranty.

Everyday Knife Care

The most important rule is simple: keep your knife clean, dry, and protected. Wipe down between cuts if cutting into moist gummy breads.

Stainless steel is highly resistant to corrosion, but it can still develop rust if left wet or dirty for extended periods.

Always clean & dry your knife promptly after use.

Blade Use

Your knife is designed specifically for cutting bread and baked goods.

When cutting particularly crusty sourdough, use a gentle back-and-forth sliding motion and allow the serrations to do the work.

To prolong the edge of your knife and avoid damage to your cutting board refrain from aggressively pushing down, pulling, dragging, twisting or scraping the knife along the cutting surface. This will dull and damage the edge very quickly and will result in a dull knife.

General knife care

Do:

Wipe the blade clean after use
Hand Wash the blade with mild soap and warm water. Dry the entire knife immediately with a clean towel to keep your olive wood bread knife in excellent condition.
Treat the olive wood handle with food-safe mineral oil, coconut oil or beeswax to preserve its natural beauty and prevent drying or cracking.
Store the knife in a dry place, ideally in a knife block or sheath, to protect the blade and handle.
Sharpen the scalloped blade with a 1000 grit ceramic honing rod if your blade has lost it's edge. Professional sharpening is recommended to maintain the proper scalloped edge.

Avoid:

Never leave the knife soaking in water
Never place it in the dishwasher. This will void the warranty and will damage both the wood and the blade.
Never agressively push down, pull, drag, twist or scrape the knife along any cutting surface.
Avoid leaving the knife wet or dirty for extended periods

Do not use the knife to cut:

Frozen food or frozen bread
Hard frozen crusts or ice
Bones
Hard foods requiring chopping
Non-food materials
Anything that could force, twist, or bend the blade

Storing Your Knife

Protect the blade when storing your knife.

A knife block, sheath, or other protective storage solution is ideal.

Although wall magnets are convenient, a metal knife bar can scratch or damage the blade.

Avoid placing the knife loose in a drawer where the serrated edge can contact other utensils.

If using a sheath: Insert the knife heel-first, then rock the edge down to the tip. When removing your knife, pull up from the heel first to avoid dragging the cutting edge against the sheath.

Honing & Maintaining the Serrated Edge

The serrated edge is designed to retain its sharpness for a long time and requires very little maintenance.

Unlike a conventional straight-edged knife, do not sharpen the serrations with a standard flat sharpening stone or pull-through sharpener.

For routine maintenance, a ceramic honing rod can be used carefully to maintain the cutting performance of the serrations. A steel rod will not be effective in maintaining the edge.

When the knife eventually requires sharpening, we recommend having it professionally sharpened by someone experienced with serrated bread knives.

Do not flatten, file, or grind the serrations. Doing so can permanently change the geometry and performance of the blade and will void the warranty.

2. Olive Wood Care

Olive wood is a natural material. Every handle has its own unique grain, colour, and character, and it will gradually develop a beautiful patina with use.

Cleaning

Hand wash with warm water and mild dish soap.
Wipe the handle clean rather than soaking it.
Dry immediately with a clean towel.
Never place the knife in the dishwasher.
Do not leave the handle submerged in water.
Prolonged exposure to water can cause natural wood to swell, dry out, or crack.

Maintaining the Wood

When the handle begins to look dry or feels less smooth, apply a small amount of food-safe mineral oil, coconut oil, beeswax, or an appropriate food-safe wood conditioner.

Apply a thin coat, allow it time to absorb, then wipe away any excess.

A little maintenance is all it needs. The natural variation, grain, and gradual patina of the olive wood are part of what makes your knife unique.

A Note About Natural Materials

Natural materials change with use. Small variations in colour, grain, texture, and patina are normal characteristics of real wood and linen—not defects.

With proper care, your Feinbackhaus tools will become even more beautiful and personal with time.

3. Rattan Proofing Baskets - A Tradition of Natural Proofing

Our baskets are certified Safe: Our Indonesian rattan has passed standards of food safety contact as outlined by the FDA & LFGB — ensuring food-safe, chemical-free proofing.

Since your unbleached rattan basket is a natural product, it may arrive with some slight imperfections. These in no way affect the performance of the basket. We recommend brushing it out prior to use.

Using Your Basket With a Liner

We recommend that you wash and dry the liner before the first use to remove any dust particles or fibres. Machine wash with unscented detergent and tumble dry without a fabric softener.

Seasoning Your Basket

A new rattan basket may benefit from being lightly seasoned before its first use. Inspect your basket and remove any naturally occurring rattan fibres. They can just be pulled away from each rod.

Lightly mist the inside of the basket with water.
Dust generously with flour, working the flour into the weave.
Shake out the excess.
Allow the basket to dry completely before using.

Repeat once or twice if the basket is particularly new or the dough is sticking.

Over time, flour will naturally build up in the weave. This is normal and desirable—it helps create a naturally non-stick surface.

Before placing dough in the basket:

Make sure the basket is completely dry.
Lightly dust the inside with flour. Rice flour, or a rice-flour and bread-flour blend, works especially well to prevent sticking.
Place your shaped dough into the basket seam-side up.
After proofing, gently turn the dough out onto your baking surface.

Tip: Avoid using excessive flour. A light, even coating is usually all that is needed.

Cleaning & Storage

Do not put the basket in the dishwasher.
After use, allow any remaining dough to dry completely, then gently brush it away.
If necessary, use a dry brush to remove excess flour. Excessive flour left in the basket can attract insects.
You can wash your basket by running it under warm water. Do not use scented detergent or soap. Use a stiff brush to remove any stuck on dough or dirt. Shake off excess water and dry immediately.
Dry your basket in the sun or in a warm oven set at 170ºF for 30 mins or until completely dry.
Always allow the basket to dry completely before storing.
Store somewhere dry and well ventilated.

3. Linen Liners & Bowl Covers

Crafted from natural, unbleached European flax linen and Certified by OEKO-TEX®, our linens are strong, breathable and well suited to sourdough baking.

Linen becomes softer and more absorbent with use, making it an excellent long-term companion for your baking routine.

Linen Proofing Liners

Shake or brush off excess flour after each use.
Wash when needed in cool or warm water using a mild, unscented detergent.
Never use bleach and fabric softeners.
Tumble dry in dryer.
Do not store while damp.
Linen naturally becomes softer with use and washing.

Linen Bowl Covers

Wash in cool or warm water with a mild detergent.
Never use bleach and fabric softeners.
Tumble dry completely before storing.