Thread: Kitchen knife suggestions

RMC,

That might be the only of my parts whats got any smarts.

I have to agree with DC here.
OVer the past weeks I have been trying to hone my chef knives, which are a cheap (50) set stainless steel made in china.

stainless is not accurate, because when they come out of the dishwasher, they will have stains where the water drop clinged to it.

They also don't hold an edge. They get almost there, and they cut ok-ish, but I have to refresh the edges with a coticule almost every time I use them.

Otoh my solingen potato peelers (which are really stainless, and really hard) take a very fin edge that is so sharp the knife seems to float through whatever I am trying to cut.

Originally Posted by Bruno

....stainless is not accurate, because when they come out of the dishwasher, they will have stains where the water drop clinged to it.....

NOOOOOOO!

One trade off with better knives are they don't belong in the dishwasher!

The set I have state they will not be harmed in the dishwasher (menaing the handles and such) but it is STRONGLY recommended they be washed by hand!

v/r

Allen

We hardly ever wash by hand. Only when there is no more room in the dishwasher.
And quality stainless should be fine. My potato peelers don't mind.
Besides, my wife is not likely to care enough.

The things I sometimes see her do with knives make me cringe.

When we have some more room in the household budget to spend money on the kitchen, one of the things we will do is to buy a set of Japanese knives.
With that price tag I am fairly sure she will treat them right. Even then I will be tempted to buy her a quality set of stainless ones to be safe (like wustenhof or something similar)

But with our current set of cheap knives, I can't be bothered to handwash them unless I have to. They are damaged anyway from years of being sharpened with one of those things with ceramic wheels.
...
What can I say. there was a time when I didn't know any better.
At least I made an effort to keep my knives sharp. While it was far from ideal, it still showed I cared, which is more than 99% of the people out there.

So these days I use those knives to practise my freehanding and the fact that they dull so soon is a 'bonus'

Finally bought myself a Henckels last saturday. I'm loving every minute of it. Before this I only had the cheap "titanium coated" kitchen knives. I figure I'll just buy ONE nice knife a year and gradually replace the crappy ones with good ones.

All my kitchen knives are Wusthof and I truly love them. a butchers steel puts them good as gold and they have never failed me. No0ne touches these knives but me and they have never seen the inside of a dishwasher.

Thought I had commented here but apparently not. I, too, have a Wusthof knife and it is by far the greatest knife I have used. The blade seems as sharp as my straights! I don't even need a cutting board anymore... I just hold whatever I need to cut in the air and slice it apart

Originally Posted by LX_Emergency

I figure I'll just buy ONE nice knife a year and gradually replace the crappy ones with good ones.

I like that thinking.

X

I have a set of german knives on the counter.Had them for 30 years. Got them as a wedding present. I use the paring knife. On occassion the chefs knife. The set is beautiful in its heavy wooden butcher block holder. And only needs the occassional dusting for keeping it in shape.
For what I REALLY use in my kitchen:
A $5.00 Chinese cleaver - stainless steel - all metal including the handle
A Fishing knife for deboning and even on fish in a pinch
These hide in the kitchen drawer along with their"hone" which is one of those set it on the counter and pull the finely crafted blade through it a couple of times thingies.
Depends on the type of cooking you do I guess but MY type of cooking needs a paring knife a deboning knife and a come whatever ya wanna chop up cleaver or a really skookum chefs knife.
Oh ya - a bread knife.
I hang my head in shame.

You'd be suprised how many cooks out there have the same veiw on kitchen knives. While quality knives are not for everyone, if you want to take the steps nessisary to care for them.... it's a great feeling. When I was still interested in western knives I held Wusthof in high regards, I still do for that style. They are a good product for it's level. Messermeister was soon overtaking that slot when I was given my first japanese styled knife. It was like opening the door to cutting for the first time. I almost killed that knife on a daily basis and learned how to repair the damage I did to it. All that just from the learning curve going from western knives to Japanese knives.

If your looking to change directions you can get any number of good affordable japanese knives to use as Guinie Pigs Trust me I know what it's like trying to get the spouse to quite putting EVERYTHING in the dishwasher, took me years to get her to stop putting knives in there... forget getting her to wash them withing 24 hours... /yikes So she has her set of knives and is not alowed to mess with mine, they get all rusty and she doesn't have a clue as to "How did that happen?" Arrgghh!!!

So many direction to go and there are plenty of knife choices to choose from when you get there

I don't even know how many knives I have in the kitchen anymore (shh don't let me wife see this) with so many more planned for I'll see if I can post something.....