Knife Snobbery 

   Really, this is just a subcategory of Equipment Condescension which itself is simply a symptom of General Culinary Hoity Toitiness. Like so much in this culture of Williams-Sonoman “Image is All” crap, what is pocketed in the slots of your knife block !(What!? You don’t have a knife block? How awfully pedestrian…) is far more important than how well you can cut food into smaller pieces. If you can still afford food, that is, after buying the 20-piece Henckels 5-Star Block Set that matches your granite counters and Wolf Professional range.

   Through the years, from cooking professionally and trying to impress the public, colleagues and women to settling down and trying to astonish children by slicing hot dogs into matchsticks, I’ve honed a more pragmatic view on many things – including my cutlery arsenal. Perhaps this fresh, incisive perspective may be of some use to you.  Who knows – with gift giving season starting to swing knives may be on your mind, whether as Christmas presents for others or things you might treat yourself to. So here’s some stuff to think about when thinking about knives.                                      

 

Tang – Very important factor in choosing knives that you won’t have to replace for a very long time. The term refers to the continuity of the blade metal through the handle. Tang affects weight, balance and overall feel to a knife. A full tang knife is one whose back (bolster and shank) end runs through the length of the handle. You can see this in some classic style knives – the handle consists of two pieces bolted onto the shaft of metal extending from the blade.  Half-tang are what they sound like – the metal only extends part way through the handle and aren’t anything I could recommend; there are enough full tang knives out there to fit any budget. No tang? No buy! These things wouldn’t last you through a summer barbecue.

 

Material (blade) –Steel still rules the slicing industry and the cost of steel knives will depend in part on the quality of that metal.  The quality of steel you should buy is kind of up to you and the tasks you’ll be putting the blades through.  Figuring out the caliber, or grade, of the steel can be a confusing pain in the ass.

Manufacturers of stainless steel might throw out numbers like “18/10”, which refers to the proportions of chrome (in this case 18%) and nickel (10%). Some prefer numbers like “360” or “417” which have similar meanings but are far less decipherable.  Chrome and nickel, or manganese or molybdenum or whatever are alloying metals in steel which affect corrosion resistance, magnetism, and heat conductivity and oh, good golly fuck I am slipping into a metallurgical ramble now…

   Okay here’s the gist of things: Carbon Steel Knives – hardest and form the sharpest edges. They’re also harder to come by these days and expensive – especially for knives made from the most basic of steels. Also require lots of maintenance as they’re prone to rust and the relative brittleness of carbon steel means more frequent sharpening.  Stainless Steel – Ignore all the little numbers and find out how it was made.  If it was forged – heated, stressed and beaten into shape – the manufacturer will proudly state that in the display. Forged blades are more durable. If it was stamped, or die-cut, from a lower grade of steel the box will probably go silent on the issue.  If it was made in India or China it probably is the stamped-out variety.  Die-cut blades require sharpening a little more often, but it’s not as though the cheaper blade is going to crumble apart in your lifetime.

   What it comes down to is what you do with knives.  Buying expensive cutlery could mean less sharpening for you – but if you don’t use your tools frequently then maintenance is beside the point.  You could get away with a snazzy set of die-cut blades and be just as effective in the kitchen as the style-spaz that bought a full set of Wusthof Ikon’s for two and a half grand. I still cut all sorts of foodstuffs in greater quantities and frequency than the average home-cook – old habits die hard – but even my workhorse blade, a 10” cook’s knife, thinks it must be in a rest home compared to the 2 to 5 hours it could spend in motion on any day when I was a line cook.  My drawers and knife block are stuffed with more blades than necessary, but if I’m ever in the market to replace a blade I’d be more likely to start shopping at Target before Macy’s. 

   Ceramic Knives – You could shave your privates with the edge of a ceramic blade, but the jury is still out on the long term efficacy of using them. Usually made from zirconium they hold an edge for a very long time. But eventually they will need to be sharpened and you’ll have to send them out for that. If you fuck up a ceramic knife doing some home sharpening, nobody will replace it for you. Can’t chop hard things with them either.

 

Weight – a knife’s efficiency depends, in part, on its weight. Particularly with larger knives (“cook’s” or “chef’s” or whatever) an increase in the heaviness of a blade helps make the job of cutting easier – up to a point. In the case of cleavers weight can mean everything as you slam the blade down from a height and chop the hand off your enemy…or just cut chops from a pork roast…

   Naturally, effective weight means there is a limit to heaviness. A cleaver won’t help you dispose of the body if you can’t raise it high enough to chop those pesky limbs into manageable pieces. Other knives aren’t especially useful if your arm tires quickly as you slice up some vegetables. When choosing a knife ignore the American instinct of going right for the big 10” Wusthof Grand Prix cook’s knife and earnestly think about what you need and what you’ll feel comfortable with. I have a 10” Wusthof Grand Prix Cook’s knife. And at six feet tall, 205 lbs (give or take)(usually give)(okay, I’m 222 as of last Saturday) I’ve got the build for a big knife but I don’t always feel like using the damn thing. But I have to anyway because I haven’t had the heart to replace my dear, departed and wicked cheap 8-incher.

 

Length & Width & Shape– Obviously, the ease with which you can cut stuff has is influenced by blade length. That’s why there are so many knives for the plethora of disparate tasks you’ll come across. A paring knife requires more time and effort to cut thin, even slices off a flank steak while a cook’s knife demands a great deal of attention in the awkward chore of peeling radishes. Wide blades are ideal for chopping and thin ones do well when getting bones out of meat. Curved knives make arced cuts and help you slice without stabbing and serrated blades are for shit that’s better off sawed. But one can always get by on whatever is at hand – I hear Japanese whalers can mince a Minke with pocket knives.

 

Now how long your knives need to be will depend on a couple of things.  For the smaller jobs, generally smaller knives help.  You can pare a mango with a carving knife but it really ain’t so much fun.  When it comes to knives that are supposed to be long – cook’s, carver’s, fillet, etc. – then the specific length will depend on you.  The easiest thing to do is grab the biggest knife in the store under the assumption that huge will always be better.  It’s a knee-jerk, Texan way of seeing the world. And like so many Texas things it really has no meaning outside of Texas.  You need a knife that will chop the living fuck out of your pantry without over-exhausting your hand.  If you’re 5’7” a 10-inch blade might feel awkward and be inefficient.  Could even look silly in your hands.  The big blade does do well for me, but if I can ever justify the expense of adding an 8-inch cook’s to my knives then the 10- inch would surely start collecting dust.

 

Curvature –This is especially important to consider when buying a new cook’s knife. Different cutlery companies produce different arcs towards the tip of the blade. Henckels and Wusthof, two of the largest pro-type brands, have markedly different curves on these cutting edges. For me, Wusthof works most comfortably with my natural cutting motion.  When you’re in the knife department ask to try different blades side by side on a store cutting board.  If they claim not to have boards for this purpose just start chopping invisible stuff on the store floor. They’ll probably unwrap a small plastic board just for you at that point.

 

How many knives do you actually need? It’s not unreasonable to get through your daily preparations with a single blade. Buy a 6” or 7” utility knife, keep it sharp, and it would pretty much accomplish most of what you set out to do. A two knife set up – perhaps a moderately sized cook’s knife and a similar utility – would serve you even better, allowing you to hack up animal and plant materials without incessant returns to the sink to wash your cutlery. If a nuclear blast were to occur and melt all my tools, the two knife scenario is probably what I’d choose to rebuild my kitchen and defend my canned goods against zombie fallout victims.

   These extreme money & drawer-space saving ideas are sort of moot. A couple of Xmases ago I decided to get my mom some new knives.  I figured on getting her a basic block set of Henckels to replace the ancient cutters in her drawer and give her something sharp to display on the countertop. I turned to my favorite shopping mall – Amazon.com – and began a search. And this turned up:  A fourteen piece set (including 6 steak knives) of Sabatier knives – for $39.99.  Holy Fuck! Now the deal with Sabatier is that the famous, original cutlery company has been licensing out its name for years now. The blades bearing the name can be made from France to China. So the quality does vary. But the name still has clout to lot of people’s ears, which can be good for you if you’re a brand whore. Now the ones I got my mom were a ridiculous bargain. They have good weight and feel, full tangs, and composite handles that look like some exotic Indonesian wood. Stamped rather than forged individually, for the home cook they aren’t appreciably inferior to the big boys. Too good a bargain to pass up.  The set even had a pair of kitchen shears and a honing steel; quite handy but something most people wouldn’t readily buy. The next year I got my kid brother the same set – it was ten bucks more but still a killer deal.  Recently I got them both electric sharpeners – 20 bucks a pop. I’ll probably just buy them Yuletide dishwasher detergent from here on in.

 

The big idea is that you really need to weigh out what your cutting needs really are against your budget and your desire to have show-off pieces sitting on your counter. There are good companies out their making good knives that also look good. All you need to do is keep them sharp – a very easy task – and prepping up dinner will still be as enjoyable a chore as any. I have a greater variety of cutting implements than most people.  But my knife block is no showroom highlight.  It’s a hodge podge of plastic, composite and wood handles that hold blades I find really effective or just ones that I’ve grown used to.

Here’s what I got:

                                                                                   

 

 

 

Nella cleaver – Heavy. Chop-through-a-femur heavy.  Great for getting the backbones out of chickens or breaking up pork ribs.

 

Barclay Forge Boner – 7” piece of shit knife.  A real bitch to sharpen and doesn’t hold its edge for long.  I should throw it away rather than tell you any of this.

 

Serco 12” Hollow Ground Slicer – A swell knife for filleting meat.  Hollow ground knives have these little dimples along the cut edge which help keep stuff from sticking to the blade. Used to sit in a drawer for the longest time, doing little else beyond slicing my fingers as I rummaged around looking for stuff. Finally gave it a slot in a knife block and now it sees more action.  Great for slicing roasts and whatnot – especially when you want nice, thin pieces – and it’s flexible blade makes it great for removing the skin from large slabs of fish.

 

Craftsman Needle Nose Pliers – Little pliers, used mainly to pluck fish bones from fish or splinters from fingers. They help repair small things too, extract peanuts from your ears if necessary, etc. Note: pliers not actually a knife.

 

Wusthof Grand Prix 10” Slicing/Carving Knife – Now at first this may appear to fly in the face of my rails against unnecessary expense in cooking tools. But keep in mind two things: I used to cook for money and knives that held up under heavy use were necessary thus lending some practicality to this sort of knife; I was also younger and more image conscious once, prone to blowing more money than truly necessary on stuff. I could easily have survived on the Wusthof Classic line but the GP series looked wicked cool.

   And they felt a little better in my fat paws.  Anyhoo, a good carving knife is a keeper.  A little lower in maintenance than a hollow ground and a fixture for years of holiday feasting. With its narrow, thinner blade it can be your every day pot roast reducer or sandwich halver.

 

Wusthof G.P. 10” Cook’s –  Purchasing one of these is like buying the Magnum™ condoms at the drugstore.  It either snugly fits your needs or you’re kidding yourself. (Don’t read too far into that – I’d never be high on a list of pornstar applicants.) This knife and I are a good team but as I’ve mentioned I’d probably do fine with an 8-inch blade. But this knife, with its sister carving knife are the remnants of a larger group of GP blades that I’d had once upon a time. Yes, I had fully bought into the image of me as a more serious cook, decimating paychecks to score these “super knives”. Good drinking money went to buy a core set of these Wusthof and then one night, during a really fucking wild Halloween party at my place– on-duty cops drinking from my keg wild – some jackass stole most of them.  The other two were in my car at the time and we’ve kept a shredded family intimacy for than a dozen years now. We’re not parting ways anytime soon.

 

10” Sushi/Sashimi Knife – I don’t have one of these anymore because it disappeared in the big looting mentioned above.  I haven’t replaced it – think a hundred bucks for a cook’s knife is over the top?  How about $350 for a knife for slicing through rice and raw fish? Holy fucking cow what a stupid amount of cash to part with for a knife! And yet I miss it most of all. Such a cool blade. And you always have to lament the loss of stuff that cost you a bundle. Unless, naturally, it was a pair of $400 red-flame lizard skin boots;  D-width when you’re a triple E and with a heel that was bigger than it seemed at the store. Then you simply suffer through a couple of wearings, looking like a Tennessee Tart, before letting your kid brother borrow them forever.

   $350 is a lot for a knife, granted. But this was a gift to myself for landing my first head chef’s gig. Since it was a fusion joint, heavy on the Asian, it seemed like an appropriate little present that would come in handy. Maybe if I get rich writing about cutlery I’ll spring for a $3,500 sashimi knife. They can cost that much because they have ninjas or something forging those things in pitch darkness and tempering the blades with the blood of their enemies. But I digress. You can actually get one of these knives – Japanese/Asian markets often have some – for around thirty or forty bucks.  The difference is in the forging; more expensive knives are produced by industrious, lunatic Japanese people from multiple pieces of steel of varying hardness, are a little thinner, and have handles of exotic substances like the shinbones of Chinese POW’s. They are astounding – works of art, even.  But why the hell would you want to slice tuna with a piece of art? That’d be like buying a Matisse to cover a hole in the wall.

   For the recreational sushi maker, the low end blades are great tools. Typical Western blades have a “v” shaped cross section. This shape tends to exert a downward pressure on both sides of the cut – essential pushing the severed pieces away from each other yet also squishing each a bit in the process. The Japanese knives are angled only on one side.  This puts the downward, and outward, pressure only on one side of the cut. It pushes the cut piece away from the stationary main piece and minimizes squishing, which is good when you’re trying to make pretty maki rolls. They’re also great for vegetable and herbs. And they sharpen easy.

 

Counterspace,  also not a knife, but something for prime consideration when thinking about getting big knives. It’s unlikely your counters are 10” wide or less, but think about overall space and how quickly you can accumulate stuff as you work. I mainly use a 20” x 16” cutting board on a reasonably big stretch of counter. I also tend to make meals 4 or 5 at a time (my kids dig the kitchen but don’t like it when I seem to live there) and load that counter up with all the shit I’ll need to make meals for a few days. If I don’t keep the few inches of perimeter around the board clear the tip of my knife will constantly gouge slits into vegetables, bags of flour & sugar and occasionally knock my coffee over.

                             

Henckels Classic 9” Bread Knife & 4” Utility – Nice knives, the classic series. I use the utility several times a day.  Whether starting tangerines for Jack or tearing into tough cereal bags it is the most exploited blade in the house. As for the bread knife – once you have a good one you’ll wonder how life could be sweet without it.  From bread to tomatoes to one of the highest orders of cutting you will ever perform – slicing a sandwich in half without squishing out the innards – it’s a swell knife. If you have one or plan to just be careful to stick with cutting softer foods and avoid digging the blade into cutting boards. Serrated blades can be a pain in the ass to sharpen, but an easy hand with your bread knife will provide years of slicing swellness.

 

Tramontine 4” Paring knife – paring knives have short blades with little to no curvature to the edge. This little old wood-handled girl from Brazil serves equal time with the little Wusthof utility. It’s so well used that I may have spelled its name wrong there.  Couldn’t tell if it ends in “e” or “a” and I have no clue how I ever ended up with it. But it is a cherished orphan.  As much as I use it however, I rarely pare with it.  I’d worked in couple of joints early on where the chefs would only let me peel anything with regular knives. Those were skill building exercises for certain, and thank Jesus on the freaking Cross that I have built those skills! I just take the skins off of potatoes with my 5-buck OXO™ Veggie Peeler with a big mental woody about how I could easily do it with a paring knife…

 

L.C. Germain 4” Utility – Lots of little knives at home!  Always useful. This guy hails from Japan (obvious from the name, yes?), as well as the last apartment my wife had before we shacked up. It’s the chubbiest of my stunted blades. Well used, probably what I’d choose to carry as a concealed weapon on an airplane. Just joking, of course! Or perhaps not. The FAA felt so bad about all the inconveniences it’d put on us since 9/11 that they let us bring little knives on board again! Yeee-haw! Can’t wait to get plugged by a Sky Marshall the minute I pull a tangerine knife outta my cargo pants!

 

7” Fish Boner  (quite a hit with the ladies) –  Don’t know who made this one as the half-ass manufacturer’s stamp on the blade has been worn beyond reading. I do know that it came as a Christmas gift from my step-mother. Attached to a whale-shaped cutting board that had a clamp for holding down fish tails. As a present given before the onset of my culinary career it was more odd than anything. Something you give a guy who wastes every Saturday trolling for kivers in the local reservoir and not your husband’s son who had never even mentioned fishing. Who knew that a decade and a half later it was still seeing serious use in my kitchen.

   Fish knives are thin, curved and moderately flexible.  And hence good for navigating around the more delicate flesh of fishes and skinning them alive. But also perfect for fruit and chicken and shaving your thighs.

 

Lifetime Cutlery “Jet Cut” 8” Carving – I’ve known it for my entire life and stole it when I got Ma those new knives. Cooler than useful at present. I haven’t taken the time to put a good edge back on it.

 

Forever Sharp Surgical 8” Finger Shredder -all purpose Ginsu sort of thing.  Ma bought three at a bargain store and gave me one. Best on tomatoes, peppers and limes for beer. Can’t warm up to it though.

 

Inox Shears – Kitchen shears are a pretty neat thing to have, but chances are good that you wouldn’t use them much. Good for cutting up lobsters and crabs. Just right for jointing up birds that aren’t too big. Put them on a wedding registry or any wish list of yours instead of actually buying them for yourself.

 

R.I.P. Cheap 8” Cook’s – Found it in my wife’s kitchen back when we were still a pair of tequila-drinking fornicators just starting to fall in love.  Even way back in the mid 90’s its wood handle was loose and rattley on the flimsy tang. It was crazy thin and stamped from some piece of waxy stainless steel. Ugly – at first. But then it began to beckon me from the drawer and by the time we had been married it was top dog in the block. Used it even after pieces of the dried out handle began to crack off. Even after the tip had chipped a bit. It cut everything so well, sharpened so easy, it felt like a homely angel in my hand. Finally it snapped in two at the tang and I was robbed of my friend.  They just don’t make cheap-shit blades like her anymore.

 

Scimitar – The huge, upwardly curved blade that butchers use as they tear through animal bodies.  Not a lot of home use for the average cook – the Portuguese neighbors across from my mother are known to lead cows into their garage and not back out. They probably have scimitars. I had one cause a guy from a knife sharpening service sold me a used one. It was taken during that knife heist and the only home use I recall was being liquored up and swinging it around like a Phoenician to scare the crap of party guests.

 

Electric knives – Effective but unnecessary. Then again, it is a power tool you can play with at the table. I don’t own one so again I’m just rambling.

 

There’s lots of other blades swimming through my drawers: oyster shuckers and clam blades, a 4” bird’s beak once used to make little footballs, “quenelles”, from potatoes and a 7-inch needle-looking Wusthof that seems to have been produced by grinding a boning knife down to nothing. It was left with me by a friend who went to Europe for a few years. I use itfor stabbing lobsters through the eyes before boiling them.  Pastry knives and pizza wheels,  cheese blades and channel knives…lots of extraneous stuff of no value when suggesting a tool-kit for the home cook.

 

Sharpeners – These really are indispensable if you want to cut with knives rather than mash food with them. You can get good, easy manual ones for around 20 bucks. Decent electric ones don’t cost much more. Look on the back of your electric can opener if you have one – chances are there’s at least one knife sharpening slot. A whetstone is neat but tedious to master.  Honing Steels are handy as all heck, but don’t rely on them to sharpen your blades. Knives go dull, in part, by the edge folding over itself during use and it’s the honing steel’s job to slow that process down. Works best when you use it frequently.

 

Knife Blocks – These do help prevent dulling and nicking of your blades while storing. But, Jesus F. Christ do not ever, under any circumstances, buy a granite knife block. Or one made from any type of rock. Well, you could get one – they make superior door stops – but don’t put knives into it. Wood, or other similarly soft materials only. Or just keep them in a drawer. Otherwise you’ll have to live with constantly dulled and knicked blades.

 

Cutting Boards – I’ve got an assortment of polyethylene boards that were bought at Target. None of them cost more than 5 bucks. This is best type of cutting surface for your knives. They cause the least amount of damage to blade edges and can be popped in the dishwasher for cleaning and disinfecting.  Wood boards are next best and are prettier to leave on the counter.

 

Did I forget anything? Does any of this help? Probably not. I got going and just kept babbling. So the boiled down advice would be this – An 8-inch cook’s, a 10-inch slicer and a 6-inch utility knife would cover most of the cutting scenarios the home cook is likely to run into. These are only suggestions – a shorter cook’s and a longer slicer might fit your needs better. Add in an inexpensive vegetable peeler and a sharpener and you’ll be a very effective human food processing unit.  From there you can fill out your arsenal according to your budget and desire to play with fancy tools.