I have been using the mat on the site given for years and it works great and is perfectly fine. Even though it says plastic it is more the form of silicone to me or rubber and not plastic. Keep in mind your chocolate is not very hot just melted... I would recommend that you double the amount of chocolate for an 8x12 mat since if it is too thin it does not break well and gives poor results. Also... build a little lip out of foil around the edge of the mat.

Moonstar if you check the site under food decorations, you'll see that there is a food safe mat that makes a wood grain impression.

I would appreciate hearing from MS staff regarding mat for bark design as it is not food safe.

What you can use are preprinted chocolate transfer sheets. There are hundreds of transfer designs to choose from. They're available from Amazon.com or other on-line sites such as Gobal Sugar Art, inkedibles and Shopzillas. They're easy to use and give chocolates a professional look.

The website for the texture mats doesn't seem to have food-safe plastic mats. In fact, here's what the product description states: "The Texture Mat is a patented clay tool for making textures on the surface of wet clay. The artist or student can use the textured clay to build many different forms. It is only for clay, not for Food."

Has anyone tried this with a wood-grain tool instead of the mat? I wonder if it would work... ?