I see a lot of questions about pre-aging cherry. There are many techniques for this. Here's a new one I discovered:
Sodium Nitrite.
Sodium nitrite has been used to distinguish between red and white oak (it turns white oak black, temporarily, and does very little to red oak).
Over time, though, the treated white oak turns a shade of 'antique' brown as this bowl has.
I'm making a cherry bowl now. Here are two cut offs, one which has been treated with a 10% solution (by wt). I just dissolve the powder in water and mist it on. You can also soak, sponge, or brush it. The one caveat is that this cherry is from a log I just harvested. So the moisture content is still pretty high (17-18%). I am unsure if the effect will be as similar on aged or kiln dried cherry.
I do not believe it is particularly irritating or dangerous to use, but as I'd recommend with any chemical, do your OWN research on safety first...
I am curious to see if anyone else has tried this.
Sodium nitrite is cheaply purchased on SouthAmericanRiver dot com. I little goes a long way.