Kitchen Knife question-- White steel vs O1 steel

[Matt Lau]

I've recently gotten obsessed with paring knives. I'm thinking of commissioning paring knife blades from Jim Wester of North Bay Forge. It'll be profiled off of a 3.5" Nogent Sabatier blade blank. It'll likely be hand forged W1 or O1 steel. Any thoughts? When I look into the cost of having the blades made, handle materials, and time--I wonder if it'd be cheaper to just go with a nice Japanese petty knife. I'd love your thoughts on hand forged W1/O1 steel vs white steel, blue steel... Anyways, it's a nutty project. I'm not sure if I should just abort now.

[David Weaver]

Japanese petty knife in blue or white steel, it'll be made from prelaminated material and it will be harder and thinner than O1 profiles will be, and feel sharper.

Years ago, I bought a tanaka low budget santoku made of blue #2 for about $55. Stan told me that they make most of the knives out of prelaminated material (and even a low temp forger like murray carter appears to get the prelaminated / rikizai and hammers it on knives costing $500 or more).

Anyway, I'm still surprised how good the blue #2 knife is, and I'm not afraid to do anything with it because it's inexpensive. It is above and beyond any western knife I've ever used, incredibly sharp. I can imagine white 2 would be even better, and white 1 would be a risk since it's harder to forge.

At any rate, rikizai blue 2 or white 2 is probably superior to anything that you can do with O1 or w1 no matter how many times you hit it and how low the forging temperature.

[Matt Lau]

Thanks for the info. I think that you may have saved me a ton of time/money.

[george wilson]

I have a 6" Japanese kitchen knife from Lee Valley which is quite a good knife. Cost me about $29.00 several years ago. A very thin carbon steel center,with stainless sides laminated onto the core. It will get VERY sharp.

[Kim Malmberg]

Sharp enough to shave hair off tomatoes?

[Phil Thien]

Sharp enough to shave hair off tomatoes?

After first cutting a can in half?

[Dave Cullen]

Unhandled Japanese style blades can be had here:
http://www.chefknivestogo.com/knwinoha.html

There are some really serious kitchen knife freaks here:
http://www.kitchenknifeforums.com/forum.php

[george wilson]

Sorry,I haven't found a tomato who is willing to let me shave her.:)

But yes,the LV knife will take a truly razor sharp edge. I'm very happy with it,and it didn't cost a fortune.

[David Weaver]

Blue 2 will get sharp enough and hold it at a gradual enough angle that I generally keep that knife in a cabinet now (wife hates it and I have a young experimenting daughter who would love to try it) and get it out when the random person comes over and pops off about how sharp their knives are, etc.

I haven't had any professional chefs over (they would probably appreciate the sharpness for vegetables), but everyone else has requested to use the german knives after cutting a little bit with it. For the $55 or so that knife cost, it's absolutely heavenly to use in fruits and vegetables, especially if you have anything that's a bit watery or on the ripe side of ripe.

If I was going to spend money on anything "more advanced", I'd want proof that it was hammered at low temperature, because there's not a lot to gain above and beyond that unless the rikizai (or actual hand lamination in rare cases) is hammered at low temperature and heat treated at low heat.

It is a little bit annoying that there are a lot of knives out there in the $350-$900 range that are somewhat obscure about how they're actually made. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of them are just rikizai/pre-laminated material with a lot of cosmetic attention and a lack of low temperature hammer and heat treat, but maybe someone like Stan Covington can confirm that.

The low cost knife I have was specified to be 62-63 hardness. That's probably about where it actually is, and is a good spot for blue and white steel - harder than that unless it was an ultra talented smith, and a knife might be chippy and less tolerant of natural stones.

[Matt Lau]

David, what knife are you talking about? It sounds nice!

I sharpen only with water stones--usually a small yellow Japanese natural finisher.

I'm not sure what Rockwell hardness Jim does, but he's plenty talented. His carving knives take and hold a better edge than anything I own (including my white steel chisels).

In any case, I appreciate all the info.

[David Weaver]

http://www.metalmaster-ww.com/product/30

Costs a little more now, unfortunately, but great knife. A spec reader might get concerned that it doesn't say hardness 66 or something, but in reality, it's a very good working hardness and gets sharp very easily on natural stones.

Fujibato has a decent picture of the spine - it's not a heavy knife.

http://www.330mate.com/product/239

(scroll down to see it).

My wife was disappointed when i first got it that you couldn't put it in the dishwasher. I never actually put any nice knives in the dishwasher - knives are easy to clean and a dishwasher is a good way to make a knife dull. Now she just hates it because of its sharpness. it moves through fruits and vegetables like a ghost.

A properly made low temperature forged and heat treated knife would be much tougher ( in terms of things you might accidentally do to get small chips ), but at several multiples of the cost and I'd want someone like stan covington to help me if I wanted a knife like that, because I think a lot of things that are sold on the expert market are made cosmetically sound and would not stand up to the demands of an educated japanese buyer (as in, it would be easy to spend a lot more time on finish and put a fancy handle on a knife and bring it to a bright clean polish with sharp edges and sides....and still make it out of rikizai that had no hammer time). We all have sharpening stones and the ability to them, though, so it holds its edge just fine for all of us.

[Matt Lau]

Any thoughts on Swedish steel?

I got my first fancy J knife (Ashi Hamono, Swedish steel 100 mm petty, 58-59 Rockwell) from Bernal Cutlery.

It's quite a good knife. Not perfect, but very sharp.

[Derek Cohen]

With all this information it is most tempting to make a few more knives for the kitchen. However I have learned that my wife lacks the level of reverence (fanaticism) for tools, as displayed by myself and others here. She insists on cutting on top of granite ..... Anyone care to suggest a steel that cuts granite rather than vise versa? :(

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Andrew Fleck]

With all this information it is most tempting to make a few more knives for the kitchen. However I have leaned that my wife lacks the level of reverence (fanaticism) for tools, as displayed by myself and others here. She insists on cutting on top of granite ..... Anyone care to suggest a steel that cuts granite rather than vise versa? :(

Regards from Perth

Derek

PM-V11....the word on the street is that it can do most anything.:)

[Brian Holcombe]

Derek,

I have a cutting board heavy enough that it has become a permanent fixture, for all intents and purpose. My wife is handy with the knife, but has a terrible habit of cleaning the knife along the edge and then tossing it into the metal drying rack, so now I do most of the cutting and then immediately clean and dry the knife to put it back into the knife holder. I have some beeswax cutting board finish that I regularly maintain it with.

On the general topic; I'm strongly considering a Hontanren forged blue steel knife. They're not crazy expensive like the clay heat treated blades, but not cheap either. It's aesthetically pleasing and yes, I'm one of the few idiots willing to pay more for it to look pretty. Otherwise seems to have been made with no consideration for western appeal, which I appreciate. Many of the more famous makers seem to want a high appeal in the western markets.

I have actually had a professional chef over to cook for the two of us, she was very impressed at how I kept my knives in general, which likely means I have no real reason to want to switch. Still I want to scratch the itch and get a cool japanese knife.

[Jamie Turner]

Anyone try the kits from Hock? I'm tempted to try one just for fun.

http://www.hocktools.com/KCKP.htm

Jamie

[Matt Lau]

O1 steel.
Hollow ground blade.
The knives are likely solid performers as Ron started as a blade smith before meeting Krenov.

However, you could also buy a good blade/older knife and put a handle for cheaper. (Lamson, Herder, Sabatier, Ed Wustoff, etc).

[David Weaver]

I'd agree with matt, for the total price that you'd pay with shipping, I'd get one of the main line knives (should cost about the same as a finished knife and probably be a thinner bring. But, if you want to make your own handle, you could do worse.

[george wilson]

I hope Sabatier has gotten better. I had one in the 70's and it was soft as butter. Very poor knife.

[David Weaver]

I wouldn't buy anything with 70s print on it (some of the newer sabatier knives look like any other commodity knife with a fairly coarse grind and they're probably just some iteration of stainless steels labeled as carbon steel).

I'd love to try an old chef's knife in carbon steel, but they go way too high for me to just abide by curiosity. I've managed to track down used henckels and wustoff knives for about $30 per, but it takes a little looking to find one that's just dug out of an estate (not much wear or use) vs. one that comes out of a large lot that were used in a restaurant (tons of wear), and it's the same price either way. I guess you pick your poison in knifes, either you get nicks or deformation, and deformation is pretty easy to correct quickly with a steel.

I'm somewhat partial to friodur because they use a higher carbon steel than wuthoff does (wusthoff uses a medium carbon steel now), but I have to admit that between the two knives I use a lot, the wusthoff seems to work just as well as the friodur and neither will wow anyone with edge holding in terms of their ability to always have a fresh clean bevel, but they like a knife steel and a lot of what you can literally *see* in the edge can be steeled out if caught early - to the point that it shaves hair again (that's assuming that someone has a polished steel).

There are a lot of $80/$100 knives out there made of medium carbon steel now, though, and that's disappointing. Even though it functionally works pretty well, you have to feel like you're being sold an easy out when you're paying for a top quality basic production-made knife. there must be too many links in the chain wanting their piece of the action before the knife gets to us.

[Evan Patton]

I hope Sabatier has gotten better. I had one in the 70's and it was soft as butter. Very poor knife.
George, that was my experience as well. I haven't shopped for knives for a while, but I didn't have great experience with Sabatier 30 or so years ago, so I was surprised to see them held is such high regard in this thread. This discussion does have me thinking about getting a hard steel Japanese petty or paring knife to complement my soft steel Henkels (which are still harder than the Sabatiers I had). I like the Henkels' shape and feel, and the edges last a few months with steeling between sharpening. I've tried a few santokus, and don't like the feel/action.

[george wilson]

I think my LV 6" Japanese laminated kitchen knife is superior to any others,except the ones I made myself out of all hard HSS power hacksaw blades. All hard are hard to find. Most have just the teeth welded on. The rest of the blade is much softer. OSHA likes them because they can't shatter,sending sharp shards flying. I buy them whenever they appear on Ebay,but am stocked up right now.

My Japanese knife will get sharper than the HSS blades,but the HSS stay plenty sharp enough for food much longer,of course. I haven't needed to sharpen my HSS bread knife for 10 or 15 years. It cuts like crazy.

[Pedro Reyes]

Is this you George? that does not look very safe... ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIKaKhM6kyk

Pedro

[george wilson]

That certainly is not me. I use a RED Milwaukee for cutting frozen bread.

[Mike Holbrook]

Like George I use the Red Milwaukee (50 year, special edition). It works well for construction too, removed all the steel posts holding up a building with it. I suggests a jack and removing the posts one at a time unless you have a very strong helper.

The only LV Japanese paring knife I find listed now is a V10 center with softer stainless laminated on the outside. it costs $62. V10 is nice steel I have a Japanese pocket knife made from V10 that I like.

I threw the Sabitiers I bought in the mid 70" away the steel was terrible, plastic would have been better and the handles all cracked almost immediately. Most of my current knives I got from a friend who is Austrian and imports them, Stubia.

[David Weaver]

V10 is a lot like 440C - it's a steel that gets some heat from pure knife enthusiasts because it's not particularly exotic, but the japanese knife makers apparently know just what to do with it. 440C is much the same way, there are a lot of people who trash it because it's common, but when it's made properly, most of those people would love the knife if you told them it was a more expensive alloy.

[Joel Goodman]

I think the biggest issue with a paring knife is how thick or thin it is and the weight and shape of the blade. These are personal preferences. For me the ability to take a great edge easily far outweighs the durability of the edge -- I mean how long does it take for a few swipes to touch up a paring knife? The Hock kit seems way too thick for a paring knife - and the 5" chefs knife is pretty short to be functional. YMMV.

[Mike Holbrook]

If I could be confident that I would be the only person using my kitchen knives I would go with carbon steel, but I know others will use my knives hard and put them up wet....so I am thinking stainless. Stainless has gotten better, and as David mentions, certain makers have learned to treat it better. I have 6" to 10" knives I am happy with but somehow my paring and boning knives grew wings and need to be replaced, apparently a common issue.

[Joel Goodman]

but somehow my paring and boning knives grew wings and need to be replaced, apparently a common issue.
+1 I have had a favorite chef's knife for 40 years but if I can keep a paring knife for 4 years I am lucky!

[Jay Park]

V10 is a lot like 440C - it's a steel that gets some heat from pure knife enthusiasts because it's not particularly exotic, but the japanese knife makers apparently know just what to do with it. 440C is much the same way, there are a lot of people who trash it because it's common, but when it's made properly, most of those people would love the knife if you told them it was a more expensive alloy.

I assume you're talking about VG10 (I don't know of an alloy named V10).

You right about differences coming from the maker. I've seen both really bad and good VG10 kitchen knives. VG10 is mid grade production steel. You won't see high end custom knife makers use them. They usually stick to the Hitachi blue or white steels, or a swedish steel for some reason.

Getting back to the OP's question. A knife steel isnt the biggest factor on the performance of the blade. It's more the knife makers skill in creating a good cutting geometry and in hardening the blade. More so on parer, as it doesn't see heavy chopping use.

My favorite reasonably priced parer it the Misono MolyB steel parer. (No.534). Very thin geometry, and comfortable in the hand.

http://japanesechefsknife.com/MolybdenumSeries.html#MisonoMolybdenumSteel

Jay
(Japanese knife jukie, now in rehab)

[David Weaver]

The other benefit to the stainless knives (I hope I didn't say this already, maybe I did) is that you can sharpen them on a relatively coarse stone, something like a worn out 1000 grit diamond hone, or on a 1000 grit waterstone, and then if you have a smooth steel you can steel them pretty hard and burnish over some of the edge and get a knife that will shave hair. Not shave hair like a straight razor, but still shave a little nonetheless.

That's an awfully fast way to keep a knife in good functional shape.

And another side comment on the parers. I like to keep the small thin german parers sharpened at a fairly thin bevel for a german knife. No clue what it is, it's defintely steeper than the grind by a fair amount, but shallower than the factory edge (which is always blunt on german knives, anyway). Those thin paring knives will actually cut bread fairly well when they are sharpened that way. They never see anything hard like a chopping knife would, anyway, so there's no reason to leave them blunt unless you live in a house with people who like to cut their fingers.

The most difficulty I had in learning the right way to maintain knives that get steeled instead of sharpening was finding an inexpensive steel that wasn't slotted (a slotted steel is a hone, and I guess they're popular because most people don't know how to hone a knife). I don't want to abrade off steel every time I touch up my knife and the *good* polished steels are expensive. The best compromise I could find is the F. Dick packing house steel. It's *almost* polished and could be made polished pretty easily with some wet and dry and a buff or polishing compound.

[David Weaver]

Yeah, I must've been in a hurry. VG10. My japanese knives are all blue 2 or white 2, but i looked up the composition and it looks a lot like 440C. A good white #1 knife is out of my price range, so I stay down in the inexpensive stuff...we're all able to sharpen here, anyway.

[Mike Holbrook]

Yes, sorry VG-10 is the appropriate abbreviation. I changed it above to avoid any confusion. I know other as good or better stainless steels for folding and large fixed blade outdoor/tactical knives but few kitchen type knives I am familiar with mention the steel type. Maybe I just need to spend a little more time searching?

[David Weaver]

For some reason, a lot of the european knife makers don't like to divulge their steels. I would imagine it's because they're something pedestrian. Same with euro razors. If I said "friodur inox stainless razor with cryogenic treatment", that sounds a lot better than "made out of 440c". The stainless razors I had, while not as nice to me as carbon steel (other than the fact that they don't rust easily) did at least prove to me that it's possible to have stainless steel with fine grain at a fairly high hardness.

[Ryan Mooney]

I hope Sabatier has gotten better. I had one in the 70's and it was soft as butter. Very poor knife.

Unfortunately Sabatier doesn't actually mean anything unless you know the specific maker: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabatier
A lot of the knives with that brand are indeed junk.. a few are quite nice but finding them is challenging.

My "best" knife is probably a Tanaka VG Gyuto (western chefs knife) style knife which has a VG10 core at R60. Its not a knife for clumsy use as the edge is pretty thin and presumably somewhat brittle (I've never tested that). Probably over priced for what it is, but it was a gift and it is pretty so it gets some special occasion use (and its one of my thinner kitchen knifes so its useful for some delicate work).

Day to day most used is a Wustoff chefs knife, personally I'd prefer a slightly thinner french style blade to the thicker German design, but that is definitely person-person choice. It doesn't hold an edge extremely well imho, its "ok" but not great. It does re-form the edge pretty quickly with a few swipes on a steel and I only have to take it to the stones every ~4 months or so.

Our most used paring knifes are some really cheap brazilian steel ground blades we got from an Ace Hardware years ago (at $1 apeace they ended up in my fishing kit, kegerator maintenance kit, garage, etc.. and few stayed in the kitchen :D). Again they don't hold an edge quite as well as I'd like but are easy/fast to tune up. They are also fairly thin which is imho a critical design feature for a paring knife, finding a forged paring knife I'd like is unlikely for that reason - most of the forged ones tend to be thicker (with a few exceptions).

In large part blade selection is a bunch of tradeoffs and different people will have different preferences based on how they use the tools. The handful of professional chefs I know who use western type knives tend to use somewhat softer blades than what a home user would consider "premium" (they are also sharpened substantially more frequently). Surprisingly the relatively down market "global" brand is fairly popular, at least in industrial use (I have a global butcher knife and it works pretty well - again needs somewhat frequent honing in heavy use but its quick to do that).

[george wilson]

Yabbut,they will give you a dirty look if you carry a file into the store and check the hardness of their knives. Even worse if you then walk off without buying one!!

[David Weaver]

In large part blade selection is a bunch of tradeoffs and different people will have different preferences based on how they use the tools. The handful of professional chefs I know who use western type knives tend to use somewhat softer blades than what a home user would consider "premium" (they are also sharpened substantially more frequently). Surprisingly the relatively down market "global" brand is fairly popular, at least in industrial use (I have a global butcher knife and it works pretty well - again needs somewhat frequent honing in heavy use but its quick to do that).

There are a lot of friodur knives for sale on ebay that come from (commercial) kitchens. They are usually about half of new price or slightly more, and I'd suspect a lot of nicer kitchens are probably using stuff of that caliber. (I worked in chain restaurants when I was a kid and I'll guarantee we had nothing that nice, but there was no such thing as a chef in the whole place. Our knives were the types with the quick molded plastic handles and the on again off again serrated teeth - probably a couple of dollars each and definitely stamped).

There's also a lot of videos of professional chefs sharpening knives and then steeling them, and they are totally littered with comments about how the chef has no idea how to sharpen a knife because they stopped with a fine india or something like that. i can only imagine the people who make those comments never steeled a knife and have done nothing but sit around and watch people on youtube running knives up way up the ladder and then finishing them off with fractional micron powders, etc.

I always get a kick out of youtube experts who tell people who make a living doing something that they're "doing it wrong".

[Jamie Turner]

Wow! Just learned more about knives in 5min than I have the past 5yrs. Thanks everyone!

Jamie

[Ryan Mooney]

There are a lot of friodur knives for sale on ebay that come from kitchens. They are usually about half of new price or slightly more, and I'd suspect a lot of nicer kitchens are probably using stuff of that caliber.

Some of those look like pretty decent deals. I'd consider that a pretty reasonable upper mid-tier knife and in a class that is more than sufficient for most peoples needs. Above that you're either a) a very heavy knife user or b) just enjoying the knife for its own sake or c) ?something else? (there's always something else :D) - not that any of those are bad.

I think the appeal of a cheap but functional blade like the globals is that they are essentially disposable in this context, I wouldn't expect one of those to be the prized knife in a upper tier chefs knife role but as a kitchen supplied knife that takes a reasonable edge with minimal work and you don't care to much when the sous chef trashes it.. well its pretty good :D

As far as sharpening there is somewhat of difference between what I'd want (or bother doing) for chopping vegies for a mirepoix (volume volume volume and a fairly rugged/high angle edge) and what I'd grab if i was going to be thin slicing sashimi (detail and consistency with a very thin edge and not a lot of backing either). For the former a quick shot on a medium fine stone and steel as needed is more than sufficient (you can easily have a knife that mostly falls through a tomato under its own weight with that), for the latter I might go ahead and strop the blade simply because getting a good cut on soft fish otherwise is such a pain in the butt (a better cook could almost certainly get by with less highly tuned tools - and would undoubtedly be faster/better at tuning them as well :D).

disclaimer: I'm not a pro chef myself, that's way to much work! hats off to those who are :D

[David Weaver]

I agree - I'd consider a used friodur 8" chef's knife from one of the more expensive series that otherwise looks like it's got more wear from getting knocked about than it does in overgrinding the edge to be a steal when they show up at $29. The trick is to find one that hasn't been ground with a power grinder (which really isn't that hard). The ones that are power ground always seem to have the heel lower than the rest of the knife. In the hands of a woodworker who can steel a knife, one of those knives will last several lifetimes. In the hands of someone who sends a knife off to a sharpening service to be ground to death, I guess maybe several years.

I'm not a pro anything, either. For sure. Sashimi and that stuff is well beyond me, I just want cutting things like vegetables and lettuce and meats to be easy, and I want the knife to be sharp every time I go to it.

My view of what I want in the kitchen is beyond a vitamix (which is completely unrelated), I really don't want much else...maybe a peeler. Just two knives and something to cut on - it leaves so little to clean and is such a pleasant way to go.

[Ryan Mooney]

You can grind the heel down but yeah there is a lot of steel that you are paying to not get on one that's been overground or used hard or for a long time (which ends up being about the same thing). Worse (although similar) in my opinion is a knife that has gotten a dish ground into to, what a pain to get ground out. Some of my grandparents old knives were really bad that way and when I took over sharpening them for grams once grandpa passed I spent several hours carefully removing steel in the right places to get them to a not-sway bellied state.

Sashimi's not that hard - needs top quality fish (otherwise grill it or bake it or something), a sharp thin knife and a steady hand and there you are. Sushi on the other hand is hard, never could get the rice just perfect.

I'd agree with you on the simplicity in the kitchen.. but then I took an honest look around at the gadgetery and well.. I'd just be fooling myself (rice cooker, two flour mills, etc.. etc.. :D)

[Tom Vanzant]

My Sabatier chef's knife from the sixties takes and hold a fine edge. Then there is this ugly U.S.Army-issue sandwich knife...upswept point and deep belly, also from the dixties. A Cutco salesman came calling once and asked me to bring out my sharpest knife for a rope-cutting comparison. I'll never forget the look on his face when he saw that knife! Very good steel, even from the lowest bidder.

[Evan Patton]

I agree - I'd consider a used friodur 8" chef's knife from one of the more expensive series that otherwise looks like it's got more wear from getting knocked about than it does in overgrinding the edge to be a steal when they show up at $29. The trick is to find one that hasn't been ground with a power grinder (which really isn't that hard). The ones that are power ground always seem to have the heel lower than the rest of the knife. In the hands of a woodworker who can steel a knife, one of those knives will last several lifetimes. In the hands of someone who sends a knife off to a sharpening service to be ground to death, I guess maybe several years.

I'm not a pro anything, either. For sure. Sashimi and that stuff is well beyond me, I just want cutting things like vegetables and lettuce and meats to be easy, and I want the knife to be sharp every time I go to it.

My 28 year old Henckels are friodur (whatever that is) and I like the chef's knife, bread, and fillet knives a lot (the chef's knife is my go-to knife, the slicing knives and paring knife not so much). A quick pass over the Chef's Choice diamond sharpener every 6 months or so and steeling every couple weeks works great--no noticeable change of the shape from being sharpened on a mechanical device. The Chef's Choice I have has a "hone", but I don't generally use it, instead finding the ground and steeled edge more durable and sharp enough. While I can and have taken my knives to stones, I really like the convenience and results from the Chef's Choice).

That being said I wouldn't mind a nice, hard Japanese tomato slicer or paring knife.

Now back to your regularly scheduled thread...

[David Weaver]

I'd agree with you on the simplicity in the kitchen.. but then I took an honest look around at the gadgetery and well.. I'd just be fooling myself (rice cooker, two flour mills, etc.. etc.. :D)

My flour mill is in the basement. So I'll play dumb on that (my basement is not the typical dank wet basement, though). In my kitchen are a food processor, a kitchenaid, a vitamix and a coffee maker. Only the coffee maker and vitamix are used regularly (I should've included that).

I used to be fascinated with devices in the kitchen that could do a certain thing uniformly and in volume. I guess that's the power tool woodworker's way. but in the last few years, I've ditched what I can. I live in an older house and the kitchen is only about 8x14 and semi galley style. It's funny that the thing that makes the counter space seem crowded, aside from the gadgets on the counter, is ...well, all of the gadgets on the counter. They're there supposedly to make life easier but they are more of a hindrance.

I count the coffee maker as OK for anyone who is used to coffee - that's not hard to give a bye to. The vitamix is OK by me because it can take food that's starting to turn texture-wise (but not flavor wise) and turn it into something that tastes good. I'm sure it's saved its cost in food that hasn't been thrown away.

I got my blue II knife out...the one my wife hates....and used it again tonight. What a delight it is. It should be illegal for something that was about $55 to be that nice to use, but it could get the uninitiated in trouble. I have two chef knives in the block - one is a chinese forged knife (and not that great) and the other a friodur chef's knife. I think I'm going to put a vg10 chef's knife in place of the chinese knife and see if my wife notices.

I can imagine the super expensive knives are a little tougher, but they wouldn't be any sharper or thinner than the inexpensive tanaka rizikai blue II knives. Wow.

[Ryan Mooney]

My flour mill is in the basement. So I'll play dumb on that

Ah well, only the impact mill is on the counter.. the burr mill is in the garage and gets taken out when I need to grind corn mostly.


(my basement is not the typical dank wet basement, though). In my kitchen are a food processor, a kitchenaid, a vitamix and a coffee maker. Only the coffee maker and vitamix are used regularly (I should've included that).

About the same set. Substitute the Bosch mixer (mixer, meat grinder, food processor, arguably blender.. but yeah vitamix :cool:) for the kitchen aid and food processor, and add a coffee grinder (the roaster is stored in the dining area bookshelf so I guess it doesn't count - and gets used outside :rolleyes:). I'll leave out a couple of someone-used-it-onces that I didn't personally buy but ended up in the general area nevertheless :mad:. Oh yeah and the electric kettle which is actually worth it imho over heating on the stove (much faster/more efficient) if you make much tea and the like. The kegerator is in the living room (I tastefully trimmed it in wood - sorry some end grain showing :p - so it counts as "furniture").



I count the coffee maker as OK for anyone who is used to coffee - that's not hard to give a bye to. The vitamix is OK by me because it can take food that's starting to turn texture-wise (but not flavor wise) and turn it into something that tastes good.

We got tired of the yearly blender replacement - but we were making more slushy drinks at the time so I'm unsure on the actual ROI there.



I got my blue II knife out...the one my wife hates....and used it again tonight. What a delight it is. It should be illegal for something that was about $55 to be that nice to use, but it could get the uninitiated in trouble. I have two chef knives in the block - one is a chinese forged knife (and not that great) and the other a friodur chef's knife. I think I'm going to put a vg10 chef's knife in place of the chinese knife and see if my wife notices.

I can imagine the super expensive knives are a little tougher, but they wouldn't be any sharper or thinner than the inexpensive tanaka rizikai blue II knives. Wow.

Yeah I don't understand people who don't like sharp knives. Mind boggling.

Ah I should mention I have laminated japanese high carbon steel knives from japanwoodworker (pretty sure they're tosagata, I don't think any were over $20 when I bought them which seems like a pretty good value for a forged three laminate knife - they are a bit more now), including an usuba type vegetable knife, a deba fish knife and an santoku. They aren't super high end (plastic ferrules) but are fairly nice knives (I think they're some form of blue steel in the middle but am not sure). I only use them occasionally, and didn't even remember they were there until I looked at the knife block when I got home. They do take a mirror edge pretty easily.

The deba is quite nice for some types fish work but I don't do as much fish as when we lived nearer the ocean so it mostly languishes in a drawer (its also nice for fancy vegie work but I don't do much of that anymore either).

I tried to like the santoku style, really did - its a nice knife.. but for most of my cooking I prefer the rocking style cut to the push style cut - I know others feel differently.

The usuba is a special creature, it does do an amazing job if you're doing very thin slices or julienne and but its somewhat delicate for any other work so not a great multi-tasker. I was motivated to get it watching Yamada and some other japanese chefs work with them.. (I can't do pretty much any of this :D)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLZUJGyuhQM


Loml can't stand using any of these, mostly because you have to wash and dry them immediately or they rust horribly.

[Alan Schwabacher]

Anyone care to suggest a steel that cuts granite rather than vise versa? :(


Something tells me that if you found it, your wife would not be happier.

[Matt Lau]

David,

We think alike!

Aside from my Vitamix (beatup metal version off eBay), Most of my stuff is cheap.

I use a big chef knife and a small knife.

I have a matched pair of the chef knife because they're made by an old guy in Hong Kong who runs a one man shop. I *had* a lee valley peasant chef knife until mom claimed it as her birthday present.

The small knife is harder for me. I want perfection, but can't find it yet.

I have a herder windmill knife that is amazingly thin, but limited due to blade profile--great cutter, poor at garnish work.
I bought a fancy Japanese petty in AEBL. It gets scary sharp and feels good in the hand. However, it feels made for a different purpose than paring--more for rough paring and minor board work.
Lastly, I have my late grandpa's "paring knife." It's a crappy piece of cheap stamped steel from Safeway in the seventies/eighties, but it holds sentimental value.
There's a vintage Sabatier en route from eBay. The kitchen knife forum seems to love them--great profile/ergos, but soft steel.

-Matt

Ps. The eBay Tanakas are considered great blades with poor fit and finish for the handle. They're the same blades sold for. 4x the price at Japan woodworker.

Pps. Agreed on the friodur. I bought a friend a Zwilling Twin Sig 8" chef for his birthday because he threw a fit regarding staining. Friodur is just molybdenum steel with cryogenic treatment as far as I know. They make great blades.

[Stanley Covington]

Since David has taken my name in vain, I will try to add something.

99% (I guess) by volume of modern Japanese kitchen knives of laminated construction are made using prelaminated steel, called "rikizai" meaning "convenient material." This material was developed after WWII to meet the demand for volume and price for consumer-grade kitchen knives in Japan. The tool steel manufacturers will laminate almost any kind of steel if you order enough of it. Hitachi's White Paper and Blue Paper steels are used commonly, but lower grades and higher grades are used too. The steel can be bought annealed or heat treated. It is NOT forged steel, so those blacksmiths in Japan that specialize in handmade knives are very careful to differentiate their products by calling them handforged (teuchi), and have been doing so for a very long time.

Pre-heat-treated rikizai blanks can be cut with special dies (common for big runs in mass production), or with a laser (smaller runs by smaller manufacturers). They are then ground and decorated. This is mass-production stuff.

These knives cut very well, certainly better than most people can sharpen them. Remember, the sharpest handheld blades are used in surgical and woodworking applications, not kitchen knives, or even chef's knives. If you doubt this, examine the edge of a professional chef's or itamae's best knife. He prefers a slightly rougher edge, compared to, let's say, the blade of a finishing plane used for kiri or other delicate softwood, because the rougher edge acts like serrations cutting meat and vegetables better. So I am all in favor of rikizai for household kitchen knives, as far as it goes.

There is no disputing that hand-forged blades are superior in every way but price. The same White Paper or Blue Paper or Swedish steel improves greatly beyond rikizai when forged. But I doubt most amateurs can tell the difference in a kitchen knife. Certainly the best Japanese chefs and itamae can, and they seek out hand-forged knives.

Rikizai works well with the processes used to make what is called "damascus" steel, or 'pattern-welded" steel nowadays, and it is why you see so many consumer-grade kitchen knives with this decorative feature, although it adds absolutely nothing to actual performance. Always reminds me of Mike Tyson's facial tats.

Henckels Cermac M66 is the best mass-produced knife in the world, IMO. It is made for Henckels in Seki, Japan, where they know a thing or two about knives, using a powdered steel by Hitachi called ZDP-189 sandwiched between ATS34. The ATS-34 is more flexible and prevents the more brittle powdered steel from breaking. I am told by people in the industry that, depending on the heat curve employed, ZDP-189 can be hardened to 73 RC and be very functional. I don't think Henckels knives are that hard. The heat-treatment is only done by firms under license with Hitachi, so Henckels had to have it made in Japan. This is an example of an excellent rikizai product. My wife is very happy with hers, even though she complained about the price. I have bought her a lot of knives over the years, and I get the job of sharpening them.

The downside to rikizai is people overcharging for it, and claiming their rikizai products are hand-forged, or equivalent in performance to hand-forged knives. So Caveat Emptor. If you want high-quality blade with the crystalline structure only hand-forging (minimum of 3 heats) can provide, that thin damascus thing with the fancy handle may not be the real deal. So let me make it clear: I am all in favor of rikizai kitchen knives, and highly recommend them for most people and most applications. But I suggest you remember the next time you go looking for one that the basic Seki Japan rikizai santoku (not chinese knock-off) that costs $45 will probably cut just as well as that beautiful $250 damascus Seki Japan rikizai santakou with the urushi-finished chestnut handle (like I saw in Seattle last week). The decorative features are what cost so much.

A bigger problem for woodworkers is those Japanese manufacturers that make chisels, carving chisels, plane blades, kiridashi and marking knives from rikizai, and sell them as if they are hand-forged. I won't mention names.

Stan

[David Weaver]

This brings up a chance for me to show my rikizai prizes, and because I'm somewhat stingy, they are about as inexpensive as made in japan knives will be (without being completely unidentifiable)

The bottom knife is a tanaka santoku in blue #2 that I've had for a while. It's sharpened with no secondary bevel generally, but the very very edge is steepened slightly. It is the knife that I get out when people boast about how sharp their knives are. You can cut a watermelon with it with almost no effort, and cutting vegetables is silent. My wife hates this knife. I love it, it was about $55 or something delivered. Hardness spec was 61. It holds up extremely well in the hands of a careful user, kept completely in shape with a single natural stone.

The top knife is a low-price make called Tojiro DP and it's VG-10 core, and stainless cladding (it was about $70 - less than most euro 440C knives cost, and less than a fair number of medium carbon euro knives). My wife hasn't noticed it yet. It looks like a regular knife. The only problem with it is that it is so inexpensively made that it's just ground and then a secondary bevel was applied like a western knife. I haven't used it too much tonight, but it whispered through potatoes tonight.

I refined the bevel somewhat before using it (thinned it) ,so the total bevel is probably about 35 degrees, and the grind if the knife is fairly thin. It is sharp enough to warrant care, but the best thing about it is that I had a spread of oilstones out on the dining room table, and this knife is also spec 60-61 hardness, and sharpens easily on an array of oilstones - and ground on a soft arkansas very quickly, it took maybe five minutes to hand grind the bevel thinner. It's stainless, so the edge didn't wow right off of the stones, but a minute on a hanging strop changed that significantly.

The nicer knives Stan is talking about are better than these knives, but these are so far beyond the quality of anything you can get locally that they are pure pleasure to work with. I sharpen them only by hand, which is true of all of my knives. Grinding with something else to sharpen by hand later is a good way to waste steel. I resharpen them by hand faster than someone would be able to get out a sharpening machine, so it's not as if I am paining myself methodically fiddling.

I got the VG-10 core knife because of this thread. My wife doesn't usually use chef's knives, which is why I've gotten away with it so far, but she will use it at some point and it'll cause a problem! I think I'll still get away with it in the end because it "looks like a regular knife".

291432

[Evan Patton]

Nice Hello Kitty placemat :D

You guys are enablers! Now I want a good rikizai slicer. Oh and a paring knife, too!

[David Weaver]

It's starting to sound like stanley has turned a dirty secret (rikizai) into something people will start demanding :)

(hello kitty, disney, etc, get their share of my money. Whoever created that stuff really knows how to extract money from parents, and my 4-year old daughter would say "get your dirty knives off of my placemat" if she caught me using it for a photo background :o)

I only have the advice implicit already if you want something japanese and want performance per dollar. Find something where the steel is specified and the hardness at least 60, and after that buy on knife shape and price. I have a third low-cost knife not in this picture (a white steel deba), and all three of them are very good - much more pleasing in terms of metallurgy than any european knife I've used.

[Stanley Covington]

I only have the advice implicit already if you want something japanese and want performance per dollar. Find something where the steel is specified and the hardness at least 60, and after that buy on knife shape and price. I have a third low-cost knife not in this picture (a white steel deba), and all three of them are very good - much more pleasing in terms of metallurgy than any european knife I've used.

You know the philosophical difference between the French & German and the Japanese (and perhaps the English) traditions for kitchen knives. The French & Germans, using good steel from the blood-soaked Alsace Lorraine region they have fought over for millennia, could easily make their blades harder, but they make them relatively soft intentionally so they don't chip and can be quickly sharpened on (crappy) stones or a steel. To them, that is a good knife. Ishiatama indeed.

On the other hand, the Japanese, using a naturally far superior, but way more expensive and difficult to work steel (tamahagane) have long had a fetish for really sharp blades that stay sharp as long as possible. And they have good stones to sharpen them too.

I can sharpen a kitchen knife for my mother, who is American (or for an American customer, like I used to do when I worked on homes) and the sharpness frequently frightened them. But in the case of my Japanese wife and her mother and sisters-in-law, when I get one of their kitchen knives really sharp during a visit, they are thrilled, and immediately start giggling and cutting vegetables like fiends.

For women like that, rikizai steel is the best combo of price and performance they are satisfied with. The standard Henckles or Wusthof products are just too soft and too expensive. Ergo, the Cermac M66.

Stan