Thread: Kitchen Knives

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

Problem with end grain brds is they also suck up and retain fluids that harbors bacteria.
Best cutting brd I have ever Had was a 24 inch end grain japanese round doug fir brd, 4 in. thick
always had mold on it.

studies show that end grain and in general wood boards collect the lease amount of bacteria.
If you oil your board on a reg basis then nothing gets in. Wiping with vinegar once a week also prevents bacteria accumulation.

Originally Posted by mainaman

studies show that end grain and in general wood boards collect the lease amount of bacteria.
If you oil your board on a reg basis then nothing gets in. Wiping with vinegar once a week also prevents bacteria accumulation.

I used to work for the health dept.First thing we would do is scrape an culture the butcher blocks.
You would be amazed at the stuff they grew.
To each his own tho,I will not use end grain woods on the brds I make.

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

I used to work for the health dept.First thing we would do is scrape an culture the butcher blocks.
You would be amazed at the stuff they grew.
To each his own tho,I will not use end grain woods on the brds I make.

I can see the concern.
But as Stefan says, properly cared for the wooden boards are no health hazard to anyone.

Keeping a clean board, and indeed the whole kitchen is essential to me.
Wooden boards or not

I've always used a wooden board and never had any........gibber gibber twitch drool twitch gibber.....where was I; ohh yes wooden boards, never had any I'll effects from them

As far as blunting a knife goes, any knife will dull over time that's why we sharpen them providing you don't use one of those ghastly glass ones or the like (which will wreck a good knife) a chopping board will have no I'll effect on a knife. At the end of the day its what they are designed to do !

The only time you will have issues is if you have put too steep an angle on the edge, then they will roll or chip. I've found if you put too steep an angle on western knifes the edges tend to roll and you end up with what looks like a long chip. The Japanese stuff (stainless) which tend to use harder steel just chip and you end up with an edge that looks like a saw. At least that's my experience anyway. For western stuff that use the x50crmov15 steel I stick an inclusive edge on in the 30-35° range, the Japanese VG10 (and its variants) I use a 25-30° edge and don't run into any real problems

How did the 5k edge go ?

Originally Posted by mike1011

How did the 5k edge go ?

Hasn't happened yet
But it's on my list!

Thanks Mike.

Kitchen Arsenal



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Jack

Remember gents - using a steel in the kitchen is akin to a strop in the den. You can keep a well sharpened knife in working order for a long time with one.

As for bacteria on wood boards...

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

Problem with end grain brds is they also suck up and retain fluids that harbors bacteria.
Best cutting brd I have ever Had was a 24 inch end grain japanese round doug fir brd, 4 in. thick
always had mold on it.

WTH?? I don't really know what a end grain board is but... If its growing mold, I can't help but think you have got a bit of a sanitation problem going on. I mean I am assuming its a hardwood no?

Originally Posted by Birnando

I can see the concern.
But as Stefan says, properly cared for the wooden boards are no health hazard to anyone.

Keeping a clean board, and indeed the whole kitchen is essential to me.
Wooden boards or not

Back when I was in college studying to be a meat cutter/inspector, they were replacing all the boards back to wood from the resins they had replaced the wood with. They thought the plastic would be more sanitary.

It turned out that wood naturally combats bacteria where the plastic didn't. Hence, if you didn't clean the plastic really well and let it dry properly, you had a problem.

That said, after a days work, we would always throw a bleach solution onto the wood boards and scrape off the top layer of the board with a scraper.

Seriously - if your board is growing bacteria... find some bleach. Better yet, throw it out and use a different wood lol.

Be carefull with steeling though.

If not done properly you'll actually ruin the knife.
Knife Steeling And Stropping What They Really Do


In my opinion almost everyone would be better off just keeping a large very fine hone in the kitchen. I keep my Yellow belgian coticule in the kitchen and I give the knife a few swipes every week or so.

It would also depend on the kitchen knife we're talking about. But my blue paper steel japanese kitchen knife at rockwell 63 will never see a butcher steel in it's life.

Whenever I think of laying a lot of cash out for kitchen knives, I think of the custom butchers I see with cheap looking plain knives that they use.
They are cutting every day, and if high cost knives would make their day easier, I would think they would have them.
Just lie asking contractors about tools. They can tell you what will take a pounding and keep getting the job done.