Thread: New kitchen knives

The knife shop in a nearby city held a firesale, and my wife told me I could go and have a look and see if there was anything worth having... I don't what I did to earn this but I wasn't about to complain.

So after some consideration I decided to buy 2 kitchen knives with a 20% discount. Still nowhere near cheap, but not a bad price, and I had wanted to buy good knives for a long time already.

The first one I picked was the Kai Shun dm-0701 general purpose kitchen knife. It's edge is 6 inches long, and it is made from pattern welded steel which was hammered and folded 5 times to end up with 32 layers of steel. Despite being stainless its Rockwell hardness is 61 +-1, and one of the metals in the pattern is high carbon steel.



The second knife was the Wusthof 4972 Japanese style vegetable knife. It's edge is also 6 inches long, and it is made from high quality stainless steel. It has a Rockwell hardness of 58, which should make it a bit easier to hone. I don't know hat to expect of the edge retention qualities, though they should be OK.
Contrary to the sales woman's opinion, this one was pretty dull. It is going on the coticule tonight.

I love the new knives, Bruno. So, wat's for dinner?

Nice knives!!

They look awesome

How beautiful! Nothing makes cooking better than great cutlery!

Nice knives!!!

Have you used them much yet? Thats where it's at Even the cheapest stuff is ok if you like how it works, but with good stuff like that you should be super happy

At first I thought the Shun utility was a sujihiki hehe oops

Let me know how the shun is. I have been considering a shun. To DwarvenChef from a honing standpoint are they Eastern or Western? I own Wustoff Classic and won't be letting those go I just need a couple eastern knives to round out the block.

Most Shun knives are not that hard to hone to a certain degree. I would consider them a japanese style for honeing. Some of the Shun line are out right EVIL to hone in a traditional maner, the single bevel ones jump maddeningly to mind Flattening that single bevel, I'm told, will test your endurance and patience.

The shun is a wondeful knife.
First of all, it is very thin. Less then 2 mm at the spine I would say.
It is also very, very light. For such a big blade, it probably weighs no more than a normal fork. Really.

The factory edge is sublime, and it seems to slide through meat like it is not there at all. I haven't had the courage to hone it yet. I'll practise some more on the wusthof.

Shun also comes in bigger sizes, but I like the 6" edge. It is large enough to cut almost anything, and small enough to be easy to handle.
It isn't cheap (100 euros normally. I got 20% off) but imo well worth the money.

I honestly don't know if I like the wusthof or not. I hope to make it as sharp as my potato peelers. But as far as handling it goes, I still have to get used to the shape, plus I am more used to using paring knives.
However, honing it will be good excercise.