Food-Safe Clear Coatings (Non-Toxic & Food-Contact Safe)

This article focuses on food-contact-safe sealers/clear coatings that can be used on residential household items like tabletops, serving trays (or boards), highchairs, countertops, and decorative bowls, with one product that can be used on plates and mugs (ceramics).

FDA approved?

For these applications, we won’t find sealers that are officially FDA-tested for food contact safety (apart from needing to meet lead regulations).

However, most clear coatings will meet food-safe requirements. Most will not leach chemicals once they are fully cured.

Water-based and solvent-based sealers do not leach bisphenols (only epoxy sealers leach bisphenols), phthalates (found in caulking but not normally in paints), or lead (the main ingredient that made some paints not safe for food contact in the past).

And while it is possible for sealers to contain PFAS, unfortunately this is not yet disclosed by most companies.

Does that mean any sealer can be used on food contact surfaces? It depends on how you use the item, but I would say no!

Food safe paints are here.

Food safe ceramic coatings are here.

This post contains affiliate links. Upon purchase, I make a small commission at no extra cost to you. 

Expert Review: Nimisha Suraj, Food Safety & Hygiene Consultant/Auditor reviewed the methods of analyzing coatings.

I Will Use The Following To Assess The Sealants:

• Toy Safe certifications to assess toxic metals (not as important in clear sealants compared to paints).
• The FDA’s list of approved ingredients for paint and coatings.
• The FDA’s list of ingredients that are GRAS (generally recognized as safe).
• VOC levels – priority to brands that are very low or zero-VOC. However, a solvent-based sealant that has fully cured can be safe too, it just takes longer to cure.
• Real use case – whether a clear coating is food-safe really depends on how you are using it. For objects like tables and trays, this is incidental contact. A bowl would be direct contact. None of the synthetic coatings are suitable for a cutting board. Dishwasher safe is another level.

Three Main Regulations To Identify Food-Grade or Food-Safe Coatings

1. FDA Cleared Ingredients – Section 175.300 lists cleared ingredient materials for resinous and polymeric coatings (i.e. paints and coatings).
2. GRAS Ingredients – “Generally Recognized as Safe” ingredients per the FDA. This this does depend on how the ingredient is used, though this list can help support food safety claims of coatings.
3. Toy Safe – EN 71:2019 means safe to be chewed on by a baby or child. They test for leaching (simulated in stomach acid) of toxic elements including aluminum, antimony, arsenic, barium, boron, cadmium, Chromium (III), Chromium (VI), cobalt, copper, lead, manganese, mercury, nickel, selenium, strontium, tin, organic tin, and zinc. (source)

There are more details on these regulations after the list of paints.

Food Contact Safe Clear Sealants  

1. Epoxy Coating

Epoxy coatings are thick and form a very good barrier between the paint and you.

Epoxy generally contains bisphenols (like BPA), however.

This can still be considered food contact safe by the FDA, though not always by state regulations like Prop 65.

I generally don’t talk about epoxies on this website since they can be very strong in odor and VOCs when wet.

The two parts need to come together and form a chemical reaction.

While it is still curing many brands can be very difficult to tolerate for those sensitive to chemicals.

Though once it cures many brands will be just fine. The cure time is not always what they say, real-life conditions can mean it takes longer. 

Epoxies are often used on trays, tabletops, bartops, countertops, bowls, and cups. 

The following brands are FDA-approved as food-safe:

• ZDSpoxy
• Max CLR

2. Clear Synthetic Sealer

A clear water-based polyurethane, acrylic, or polyacrylic sealer can be used over a painted wood or other painted surface to form an extra layer of durability and protection.

Most brands of low and zero-VOC polyurethane, acrylic, and polyacrylic are likely food-safe, though most are not tested by the FDA’s standards.

They can be considered food-safe based on the raw ingredients or based on Toy Safe Regulations.

Good brands include:

• Annie Sloan Chalk Paint Lacquer (which is certified Toy Safe)
• AFM Acriglaze (Certified Toy Safe and de facto food safe according to the company, based on ingredients)
• AFM EXT (defacto food safe according to the company, based on ingredients)
• ECOS sealers are Certified Toy Safe
• Fakolith is a European company that makes food-grade varnishes that are tested and certified for direct, indirect, and occasional contact with food, beverages, and drinking water, according to European regulation EU 10/2011, and/or American regulation FDA 21 CFR 175.300. They make various products including clear sealants, acrylic enamel paints, and a food-grade epoxy paint. (But it’s not clear where to buy them).

3. Shellac

While many websites and companies state that shellac is considered GRAS (generally regarded as safe) by the FDA, that does not appear to be accurate.

This document by the FDA states that shellac is not GRAS, it’s also not listed in the GRAS database here. 

It is however listed as an approved raw ingredient in resinous and polymeric coatings that come into contact with food (FDA CFR title 21 Volume 3 Sec. 175.300 Resinous and Polymeric Coatings) and it is used to coat foods, even organic foods can be coated with approved shellacs.

We consider shellac to be very safe for food contact surfaces.

If you were going to eat it you would want to look more closely at how it was processed to make sure you get the right grade.

Zinsser Shellac, the biggest brand of premixed shellac products, is not FDA-approved for food contact surfaces.

Instead, what you should do (ideally) is to buy food-grade shellac and mix it with a food-grade alcohol like Everclear to make your sealer.

4. Natural Oil Sealers

Many penetrating oil sealers are food-safe if they are all natural and the raw ingredients are on the list of approved ingredients or GRAS:

• Pure Tung Oil from The Real Milk Paint Company (used along or with GRAS Citrus Solvent). Pure Tung Oil is approved for food contact by the FDA. View document.
• Pure Linseed Oil from Tried and True (with no driers or other additives) approved for food contact: View Document.
• Pure Hemp Oil from The Real Milk Paint Company, approved for food contact, View Document.
• Pure Walnut Oil with Carnauba Wax from The Real Milk Paint Company. Walnut oil is approved for food contact and Carnauba Wax is GRAS.
• Rubio Monocoat Oil Plus 2C, a linseed oil-based interior finish that comes in clear and colored stains, was tested by the independent testing institute Eurofins, according to the underlying specification of European Framework Regulation 1935/2004 for Food Contact Materials. It is also Certified Toy Safe. Rubio Monocoat Oil Plus 2C is in full compliance when applied to a wooden surface.

Food Safe Sprayed on Coatings

I don’t know of any spray can clear coatings that are officially food contact safe. But like other options above, once cured, they could be considered safe based on raw ingredients. 

Spray-can coatings are also higher in VOCs than brush-on coatings, even the best water-based spray cans use a solvent propellant.

For solvent-based sprayed-on coatings, most of them were still off-gassing at one month’s time.

Krylon Crystal Clear Acrylic Coating is not food safe according to the company.

Regulations – More Details:

1. FDA Cleared Ingredients

Section 175.300 lists cleared ingredient materials for resinous and polymeric coatings.

Paints used in the home, for tabletops, high chairs, and other consumer goods are not officially tested by this regulation.

This section is for a coating that is “intended for repeated food-contact use and is applied to any suitable substrate as a continuous film or enamel that serves as a functional barrier between the food and the substrate.”

According to a rep for the FDA, this is usually used for coatings inside tin cans.

However, the company Fakolith tests paints and coatings against this standard.

And although this standard doesn’t apply directly to household paints, we can use the list of approved ingredients in 175:300 to see if a product would likely be safe for food contact.

(We should note that this is not the only regulation for paint/coating ingredient safety in the US, there can also be national, and state laws like California Prop 65 that apply to ingredients in coatings).

2. GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe)

GRAS substances as determined by the FDA. Many of these substances are listed in 21 CFR Parts 182, 184, and 186, or are published on FDA’s website.

Sometimes these substances are only limited to the specific application for which the determination was made. The list is not exhaustive (there can be GRAS substances not on these lists). (source)

Carnauba wax, an ingredient in many wax coatings, is GRAS and therefore is considered safe in coatings.

3. Toy Safe Standard

EN 71:2019 is a European standard, but there are a number of certified brands that sell their products in North America as well, so this turned out to be a useful regulation for the paints (it’s not quite as relevant to clear coatings).

This tests for the leaching of toxic elements including aluminum, antimony, arsenic, barium, boron, cadmium, Chromium (III), Chromium (VI), cobalt, copper, lead, manganese, mercury, nickel, selenium, strontium, tin, organic tin, and zinc. (source)

This standard simulates the leaching of metals in the stomach as if the paint were ingested by a child. (source)

There is no equivalent testing in North America, so it’s good we have some brands tested in Europe that are available in North America.

Sealant Cure Times

The final thing we want to keep in mind before looking at the best brands to use is how long it takes to cure.

The sealant should be fully cured before we put it to use on food contact areas.

Water-based zero-VOC paints can take up to two weeks to cure to the point of not off-gassing chemicals.

Be sure to check the time frame based on when you can begin wiping down the paint or when the company says it’s food contact safe.

Solvent-based paints take longer for the solvents to flash off.

At least a month may be needed for many of those sealers before you should put food on them.

I can often pick up off-gassing for more than a month off of conventional solvent-based coatings.

Shellac is an exception because the solvent is alcohol and that flashes off very fast.

Corinne Segura is an InterNACHI-certified Healthy Homes Inspector with certifications in Building Biology, Healthier Materials and Sustainable Buildings, and more. She has 10 years of experience helping others create healthy homes. You can book a consult here.

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