Kitchen Knives: Preferences, Tips, General Care

[JoNorvelleWalker]

A few days ago I took delivery of a new New West fillet knife.  Here it is next to my New West 9 inch chef knife:

 

 

 

I have to say the wood handle of the chef knife is much prettier than the fiberglass of the fillet knife.  Sadly the factory supplying the impregnated wood burned down.  Now that I'm looking for it I can't find the quote but I believe New West claims the only people using the same steel and the same handle material were the military.

 

Apparently New West knives are now manufactured in Idaho rather than made by Lamson and Goodnow in Massachusetts.

 

[gfron1]

7 hours ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

A few days ago I took delivery of a new New West fillet knife.  Here it is next to my New West 9 inch chef knife:

I have to say the wood handle of the chef knife is much prettier than the fiberglass of the fillet knife.  Sadly the factory supplying the impregnated wood burned down.  Now that I'm looking for it I can't find the quote but I believe New West claims the only people using the same steel and the same handle material were the military.

 

Apparently New West knives are now manufactured in Idaho rather than made by Lamson and Goodnow in Massachusetts.

 

I was gifted a NWK chef knife for a private dinner I did in Napa earlier this year, and promptly passed it on to my spouse since I prefer Japanese steel and handles, but I'll tell ya what - that thing stays sharp and can take a decent beating. I think I've only honed it once and haven't sharpened it at all and it still glides right through ripe tomatoes.

[scubadoo97]

What ever gets you through the night 

[lindag]

Asian blades have a 15 degree bevel. a picture  can't show that.

[Rickbern]

15 hours ago, lindag said:

Asian blades have a 15 degree bevel. a picture  can't show that.

 

J knives are perceptually sharp more because of the thinness of the blade behind the edge than any particular sharpening angle. That’s why the wusthoff knives et al don’t cut as well and why the chef’s choice style sharpeners aren’t so hot. You can’t just change the sharpening angle on a German blade and end up with Japanese level performance. 
 

Pictures can hint at the thinness behind the edge, that’s why the choil shots are so useful 

 

Here’s a pretty exhaustive discussion of this if you’re interested. You can see from the chart that sharpening angles are all over the place 

 

https://www.kitchenknifeforums.com/threads/thin-behind-the-edge.69329/

and some illustrations 

 

https://www.kitchenknifeforums.com/threads/what-is-thin-behind-the-edge-anyway-and-kujira.42359/

 

Edited August 21 by Rickbern (log)

[Dr. Teeth]

I know a good deal less about knives than other folks here, Rickbern in particular.

 

I mostly use cheapies like the Victorinox or Kuhn Rikon.   I have the Gesshin Rick recommends, and while it’s not my style, it probably checks all the boxes in your request as well as anything around it’s price.

 

Somewhat unrelated comment, but some of the folks at Kitchenknifeforum taught me that the Tojiro Cstapedius recommended is sold in Japan as the Fujitora line.   I like Tojiro and Fujitora very much, but I didn’t see a petty on Amazon when I checked.

[lindag]

10 hours ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

 

I consulted the Wusthof site today and they say the bevel on their European style knives is 14.9 degrees and on their Asian style knives the bevel is 10 degrees.  I have a couple Wusthof Le Cordon Blue paring knives (no longer in production) and I prefer the Le Cordon Blue to the Classic series because of the gigantic bolster on the Classic.  If I wanted another Wusthof pairing knife I would choose the Ikon.  Not only are the bolsters better but the handles are longer than the Classic and to me more comfortable.

 

However if I really wanted a pairing knife I would go with Watanabe.  I have two Watanabe knives and they are superlative.  There are three pairing knives on this page, one of which is out of stock:

https://www.kitchen-knife.jp/special/petiteknife.htm

 

Those three are double bevel, but if you wanted to know the exact angle you could write and ask him.

 

Other than that I have an almost antique paring knife from Chicago Cutlery from back when Chicago Cutlery made knives and was not just a brand name as sadly it is today.  I reserve mine only for scarifying loaves.  I also have a MAC paring knife.  The MAC is sharp and cuts OK, but it is too light.  For me the MAC does not spark joy. 

 

Have fun on your search!

 

 

Edit:  the Wusthof knife @ElsieD shared I believe is this one:

(eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

 

I was surprised it does not have the typical bolster of the Classic series European style paring knives.

 

Thank you, Jo!

[JoNorvelleWalker]

55 minutes ago, lindag said:

Thank you, Jo!

 

I was attempting to enable you.  I ended up enabling myself.

 

[YvetteMT]

On 8/20/2025 at 10:59 AM, blue_dolphin said:

Any chance you can link to a photo that shows the Asian blade?  I’m curious what it looks like an how it’s used. 
 

My paring knife went missing so I bought this cheapie Victorinox paring knife (eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

It scared my old one out of hiding but it’s been handy to have a spare. 

Im a cheap date, I love my Victorinox paring knives. 

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I mentioned that while I was browsing around looking at stuff for @lindag I accidentally enabled myself.  Not exactly a paring knife but Amazon listed it with the paring knives:  a Wusthof IKON steak knife...

 

 

Bottom is the new IKON steak knife.  For comparison a Le Cordon Bleu paring knife.

 

 

Edit:  weight of the IKON is 74.8g vs 62.4g for the Le Cordon Bleu.  The IKON is somewhat handle heavy, while I would call the Le Cordon Bleu more neutral in balance.

 

Edited Saturday at 03:42 AM by JoNorvelleWalker (log)

[JoNorvelleWalker]

After rereading Chad Ward's An Edge in the Kitchen

(eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

 

Chad says he does everything with a chef's knife...before adding that he has 43 chef's knives at his disposal.