Kitchen Knives: Preferences, Tips, General Care

[scubadoo97]

Just a few that get used most often. 3 Tojiros, 2 gyutos and a petty and a no name kiritsuke

Edited July 24, 2015 by scubadoo97 (log)

[Paul Bacino]

These two I use a lot--  I really like my Sanelli Cleaver..  it has a rubberized hand.. which provides an awesome grip!!

 

 

 

 

 

[lindag]

I admit to having a weakness for kitchen knives (among other things).  I have more than I have room for in my knife block.

The ones I reach for most often are any one with a Japanese edge; I love how sharp they are and how nicely they hold an edge. 

[daveb]

I've a few that get the most use and a few that are more specialized.  I do a little part time (hobby/job) catering prep in addition to cooking at home.  A "normal" day will find a couple of Gyuto in my bag, usually one stainless clad for some heft and release and a stainless laser for citrus, tomatoes and what not.  A Nakiri gets the nod more often than not.  It didn't used to but I find I can line up the vegs and mow them down.  A stainless or stainless clad petty of course.  A bread knife and a suji round out the bag.  At home I do 90% of my work with a 210 Gyuto but always have the others to play with.

 

 

 

[daveb]

Ntxt

Edited August 2, 2015 by daveb (log)

[dcarch]

If you keep a working knife for rough chopping and slicing, and a separate sharp knife for fine slicing, you almost never have to sharpen your knifes (assuming you have a good wood cutting board.)

 

Normal meat and vegetables can never dull a knife with relatively good steel. You don't really need expensive knives with fancy steels.

 

dcarch

[daveb]

You don't really need expensive knives with fancy steels.

 

dcarch

 

This part I agree with.  The rest not so much.

[dcarch]

This part I agree with.  The rest not so much.

 

Do you have a shop? Do you have machine tools?

 

My wood planes have been cutting tough wood for a long time and still remain sharp.

MY drill bits have been drilling metal for many years, and they are still useful.

My metal cutting saw blades have been in use to cut iron and other metals and they last a very long time.

 

Can you think of a meat, or vegetable that is tougher than metal that can dull a knife? I am not talking about frozen food, of course.

 

dcarch

Edited September 15, 2015 by dcarch (log)

[paulraphael]

Do you have a shop? Do you have machine tools?

 

My wood planes have been cutting tough wood for a long time and still remain sharp.

MY drill bits have been drilling metal for many years, and they are still useful.

My metal cutting saw blades have been in use to cut iron and other metals and they last a very long time.

 

Can you think of a meat, or vegetable that is tougher than metal that can dull a knife? I am not talking about frozen food, of course.

 

dcarch

It's kind of an apples / oranges comparison. Woodworking tools and kitchen knives generally dull by different mechanisms.

 

Most of the dulling in woodworking and machine tools is from abrasion. What keeps these cutting tools sharp is wear-resistant steel. The wear resistance comes from hardness, and also from the carbides that are abundant in many of the steel alloys used for this purpose. 

 

Kitchen knives (at least ones with higher-end metallurgy, like what's typical in Japanese and Swedish steels) dull from the edge rolling or chipping. Most of the dulling comes from forceful contact with the cutting board. Sharp knives are vulnerable to this because they typically have a very acute bevel angle, and so the edge is thin. To resist chipping and rolling they need a steel with high edge stability. This comes from a combination of strength and toughness (toughness in engineerspeak = the opposite of brittleness), from a well-shaped bevel, and from a lack of sharpening defects, like wire edges. 

 

Many of the qualities that make a machine tool resist dulling would actually make a kitchen knife dull faster. For example, lots of carbides in the steel leads to poor edge stability in a kitchen knife—you get a very sharp edge that chips away quickly. Conversely, a machine tool made like a kitchen knife (very acute edge geometry, steel with low carbides) would dull very quickly from abrasive wear. 

Edited September 15, 2015 by paulraphael (log)

[rotuts]

""  a good wood cutting board. ""

 

nice.  I have them  made many myself

 

but this is your knives best friend :

 

http://www.bedbathandbeyond.com/store/product/oxo-good-grips-reg-10-1-2-x-14-1-2-utility-cutting-board/112876?Keyword=cutting+board

 

many sizes.

 

sorry for the bit of OT.

[daveb]

Do you have a shop? Do you have machine tools?

 

My wood planes have been cutting tough wood for a long time and still remain sharp.

MY drill bits have been drilling metal for many years, and they are still useful.

My metal cutting saw blades have been in use to cut iron and other metals and they last a very long time.

 

 

 

dcarch

 

Relevance?  Didn't think so.  My lawn mower only cuts grass - but the blade still needs periodic sharpening.  You're reasoning would suggest that grass is harder than the steel blade.

 

It's generally accepted in the knife world that the type of cutting board used makes a difference in edge retention.  End grain boards at one end of spectrum and glass at the other.  Knives dull on boards.  Any knife, any board.  You can change some properties of each to reduce or minimize dulling but you can't eliminate it.

 

Food also dulls edges.  Not suggesting it scratches or grinds the edge, just that it dulls it.  It this were not the case then sushi chefs would not need to sharpen their Deba or Yanagiba because they primarily cut through fish with little board contact.  In practice the good ones sharpen and polish their blades every day.

[paulraphael]

Food also dulls edges.  Not suggesting it scratches or grinds the edge, just that it dulls it.  It this were not the case then sushi chefs would not need to sharpen their Deba or Yanagiba because they primarily cut through fish with little board contact.  In practice the good ones sharpen and polish their blades every day.

 

One way food dulls edges is through oxidation from acids. Even stainless steel knives. Stainless alloys get their oxidation resistance from chromium, and the best stainless knife alloys have very little chromium content compared with the steels used in pans and utensils. This means they're quite a bit less resistant to oxidation than you might expect.

 

When you consider that a very sharp knife edge might be only one or two microns across, you can imagine how even the shallowest oxidation could contribute to weakening and rounding the edge. This is one reason I always wash my gyuto immediately after cutting acidic ingredients (especially onions, garlic, etc..). Ramps can actually discolor the edges of my best knives. This is one reason I prefer stainless to carbon steel for a chef's knife / gyuto. While not immune to being etched by acids, they hold up better than steel that has no chromium content. I like carbon steel for my slicing knife ... it just gets used on protein. 

 

Woody ingredients like herb stems can dull a knife mechanically. They're not harder than the steel, but they can be tough, and translate the force of the knife into bending or twisting forces that put little dings in the edge—spots where the edge either chips or rolls, depending on the brittleness of the steel. 

 

And some some ingredients are full of sand. I've stopped using my gyuto on leeks, because no matter how carefully I wash, there's always enough residual grit to give my knife edge a working over. The fatter, softer edge on my German chef's knife handles this better, and can just be banged back into shape on a steel. My gyuto usually needs to visit the stones afterwards.

 

On the topic of grit, a lot of cutting boards are made out of woods that they shouldn't be. Some woods naturally have a high silica content (sand), like teak. Bamboo boards are really composites, made from bamboo fibers and copious amounts of glue. Some of the glue used is very hard. I stay away from these. I find that polyethylene boards (like what you see in a lot of restaurants) have a tendency to grab at knife edges. If you don't use a light touch, and keep the motion exactly inline with the axis of the knife, these can chip or roll thin knife edges. It's certainly possible to use these without harm (they actually help teach you good technique) but I don't much like the way they feel.

[dcarch]

Paulraphael, I am not in total disagreement with your analysis. We are talking about degrees and different situations.

 

First, The sharper the knife, the quicker it gets dulled. That's why sushi knifes after a day's heavy restaurant use will need to be touched up once in a while.(not sharpened)

 

Second, in general no one should have a razor sharp (scary sharp) knife in the home kitchen. A very sharp knife is all you need.

 

​Oxidation to dry steel and stainless steel does not occur in normal air,  and very few foods for every day home cooking are very acidic to do damage to the edge under normal use.

 

I have found that almost all new good knives out of the box come with very sharp edges for that stupid useless paper slicing test.

 

dcarch

Edited September 28, 2015 by dcarch (log)

[paulraphael]

 

Second, in general no one should have a razor sharp (scary sharp) knife in the home kitchen. A very sharp knife is all you need.

 

I think this is the root of our disagreement. Technically, yes, no one needs anything more than a knife that's somewhat sharp in order to make little ones out of big ones. But there are serious advantages to knives that are "scary sharp" by western culinary standards. In Japan, such knives would just be called knives. 

 

If you have an extremely sharp blade, whole new culinary techniques become available. You're able to work with more finesse than what's possible with European techniques. It's unfortunate that the hybridized Japanese/western techniques aren't widely taught. There isn't a lot online or in cooking school. I was lucky enough to learn from a chef who'd trained in Japan. It was the second time I threw out everything I knew about cutting and started over again, and I'm pleased that I did.

 

Possibly the biggest advantage is that your cuts will be cleaner and the food that you cut will stay fresher looking and fresher tasting. People don't believe me, but I can cut herbs hours before service and they will not turn brown. They will in fact not turn brown even in 24  hours (they'll eventually shrivel and dry out, or go limp and ferment, depending on climate). But I can make cuts that are so surgical that none of the oxidative enzyme reactions are triggered. I don't believe this is possible with a knife that's sharpened to western knife standards. A Wustoff knife right from the store isn't anywhere near sharp enough.

 

This is why sushi knives are so damn sharp—sharper even than anything I use. You don't need such a crazy sharp knife just to cut fish. But to make cuts with a glass-smooth finish, that retain their uncut flavor from the kitchen to the table, and do so to the standards of a chef who's honed his palate for such things—you need blades that are sharp as hell. 

 

And yes, every cook at a serious Japanese restaurant hits the stones every day. 

 

The advantage I find in day-to-day cooking is mostly that I like the techniques more. Western techniques are about transmitting force to the cutting board, and compounding it with the shearing action of rocking the knife. The Japanese and hybrid techniques are about letting the edge do the work. Unless I'm cutting something tough (in which case I use my german knife or a cleaver), I NEVER apply force to a knife. I do all my cutting with just the weight of the blade. And my gyuto is very light. The grip I use on the wa-handle is more like what you use on a violin bow than on a western knife or a hatchet. It's more about guiding the blade through the food than pushing it

 

I find this a lot more fun, and more interesting, and less tiring. Sometimes it's just a bonus that the cuts are all glass-smooth and surgical. 

 

I wouldn't suggest that cutting this way is mandatory. When I staged at a Michelin 3-star seafood restaurant, I saw people using a huge variety of knife styles and cutting styles. Which suggests there's no one right answer. That said, I haven't met anyone who's learned the Japanese techniques and gone back western-style cutting ... or to western standards of "sharp."

[Roger Beckett]

Anyone who does a lot of their own prep will very quickly notice how much longer things last if you cut them with a "scary sharp" knife.  Even something as simple as diced onions or tomatoes will last much longer and lose much less moisture if they are cut with a very sharp knife.

 

But not to worry, even the steel on something as cheap as a victorinox will take a 10/15 edge and hold it, alas those big heavy stupid german knives won't.

[paulraphael]

 

But not to worry, even the steel on something as cheap as a victorinox will take a 10/15 edge and hold it, alas those big heavy stupid german knives won't.

 

Yeah, victorinox doesn't make a big deal about their steel, but it does seem to take a better edge than the usual German suspects. I just use their utility / boning knives, and for that purpose keep a fairly burly edge on them, but have noticed they'll go pretty thin.

 

Some of the Japanese and Swedish steels can go much thinner. My gyuto is made of hitachi ginsanko (basically the same steel as vg-1 and the Swedish 19C-27), and I sharpen practically like a single bevel knife. About 10° on the outside, and nothing more than deburring it on the inside ... a barely visible bevel.

 

This steel doesn't hold an edge exceptionally long, but the nice thing with this thin geometry is that it cuts pretty well even when dulled. If you used it for a long shift, it would be way duller at the end than at the beginning, but still way sharper than anyone's German knives were at the start of the day.

 

The trick with a knife like this is to start with all the most delicate stuff (herbs, etc.) even though it means they'll sit longer. Finish with the more robust ingredients.

[snowangel]

I'm looking for a new knife; sort of all purpose in the 6" blade length range, prefer a narrower, thinner blade. I'm a home cook, and have a mish mash of knives -- Wustof, a Shun, some e really old Chicago Cutlery paring knives (wedding present in 1980 old), a Marttiini filet knife (that I adore) and a an scythe shaped knife that a neighbor gave me (he worked at a slaughterhouse). I haven't set a price limit, but given the kid in college, I'm thinking I'm hard pressed to go much over $150, but I don't need to spend that much. I take good care of my stuff and I'll have it forever, otherwise I'd just pick up a two pack of the cheapos at Costco.

[paulraphael]

These are the ones I use most. Not pictured are the bread knife (Mac ... these are great), cheap Forschner filleting knife, and junk drawer knives.

 

 

Top is the lowly Forschner 6" utility knife which does equal duty boning meat, taking birds apart, and slicing open sous-vide bags.

 

Next is a Kikuichi carbon steel sujihiki (meat slicing knife). Almost never used for anything else.

 

The big one is an Ikkanshi Tadatsuna 270mm wa-gyuto. I use this for about 90% of everything. It's the nicest knife I've ever used and cost about as much as all the others combined. A couple of other companies, including Suisin, make knives that are almost identical.

 

The German looking one is an Eberhard Schaff Goldhamster 8" chef. It was my main squeeze before I found the Japanese knives. Now I use it just for heavy duty stuff that would damage the gyuto. It has a fancy handle and a picture of a hamster silk-screened onto the blade, so you know it's serious.

 

At the bottom is an Al Mar pairing knife. This is an inexpensive Japanese knife imported and branded by a US company. 

 

 

The second picture shows the polished bevel on the wa-gyuto, with a cameo of the guy holding the phone. It's sharpened asymmetrically almost to a single bevel ... on the back side I do nothing but debur. The total inclusive bevel angle is under 10°. It's a very thin, very fragile edge.

Edited December 2, 2015 by paulraphael (log)

[daveb]

Do love a Tad.... Remarkably nimble for their size.

 

At the inexpensive end of the knife spectrum Wusthof is making a run on VNox's market with their "Pro" series.  A lot of retailers have the 8" Cooks Knife at a promo price of 24.95.  The knife has the classic German rocker profile, handles well, is quality stainless and even sharpens up readily.  It's available in 6", 8" and 10".  I usually favor the Japanese Gyuto but I like this one and it certainly has it's place.

 

At the $100 price point there are two Japanese knives I like, the Gesshin Stainless from Japanese Knife Imports and the Suisin Western Inox from Korin.  (the site does not like links to these).  Both have Western handles, are stainless, cut very well and sharpen readily.   I slightly prefer the Gesshin for long prep times, the Suisin looks nicer on the wall.

[paulraphael]

daveb, on 02 Dec 2015 - 10:51 PM, said:

 

At the $100 price point there are two Japanese knives I like...

 

If history is any indication, that Gesshin will get popular, and then it will get expensive. That's why threads like this never outlive their usefulness. There seems to be an endless cycle of new Japanese knives discovered for their great value, then getting a cult following, then a big following, and then ... one day they cost what they're worth, and it's back to the internet to find the next great value.

 

My Tadatsuna costs about 50% more today than it did when it was new. At the time it was affordable alternative to Suisin. Now someone else is making the affordable alternative.

 

The cycle goes really fast with the sub-$100 knives. Several years ago Tojiros were the no-brainer super value. Last I looked they'd doubled.

[daveb]

The Tad INOX is comparable to the Suisin IH and last I looked was 20% (or so) less expensive - still a more affordable alternative.  Both very good knives but well north of what the OP wants to spend.  The Gesshin Stainless and the Suisin Inox Western are comparable in price and performance and I expect them to remain very good values as entry level knives.

[Martin Fisher]

A birthday gift.

Rustic circa 1930s railroad spike forged into a knife, brine quenched and sharpened.

I may attempt to darken it via bluing.

A novelty, but I intend to use it in the kitchen (just not in contact with food) for string cutting—placed next to the butcher string dispenser.

 

[Anna N]

 Very nice. I bet the gift giver was someone who who knows you very well!

[Martin Fisher]

2 minutes ago, Anna N said:

 Very nice. I bet the gift giver was someone who who knows you very well!

 

Yes! 

[gfweb]

51 minutes ago, DiggingDogFarm said:

A birthday gift.

Rustic circa 1930s railroad spike forged into a knife, brine quenched and sharpened.

I may attempt to darken it via bluing.

A novelty, but I intend to use it in the kitchen (just not in contact with food) for string cutting—placed next to the butcher string dispenser.

 

 I want one!