CHEF'S KNIFE

>Quality
>Gyuto
>Knife

Get a whetstone

Similar shape to the blade of a typical Chefs Knife
Same functionality
Sharp as fuck
Great looks
Amazing performance. Use mine at work and it's a pleasure

Find a quality knife that is good for you, slight technique preference dictates what style of knife fits you best.

I got an Ikea knife in 2004 and it still cuts well.

I'm as amazed as you.

I have a high-quality ceramic knife that I got as a christmas present two years ago but honestly I'm still using the ikea knife - it works fine and I'm less afraid of accidentally wrecking it.

Spyderco Santoku

Victorinox is pretty good for the price. I'd also recommend a Global, I absolutely love it.

Happy with my Kiwis. Cheap as all fuck, soft ass steel, works great.

Victorinox Fibrox has a $30 chromoly chef knife that works fine.

Just looked at a $500 knife. It's pretty. But for that kind of money I could set up a whole kitchen full of cutlery.

If you want something special then find out what works best and have it made from carbon steel, then take good care of it. Blacksmiths aren't that expensive, and you'll have an heirloom instead of a meme.

Get a Mercer. They're great and you don't need to blow $60-$100 on a knife if you're just a hobbyist who doesn't cut through 60 dishes a day. It's what I've used for years. No ragrets, would shill

amazon.com/Wusthof-Cordon-8-Inch-Cooks-Knife/dp/B0001WN9VO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1471522590&sr=8-1&keywords=wusthof knives cordon bleu

Bought this knife about 6 months ago, and loving it.

i've got a ceramic knife. they're a joy to use, but cant cut through bones or fruits with stones

Neither should your steel knife. There's cleavers for that. It's not just the heavier blade, the grind is different and less vulnerable.

I don't really like chef knives for anything.

...

Victorinox is fucking wobbly shit but is good for when I don't wanna demolish my good knife.

Had my global stolen from me a few months back, couldn't afford to replace it but with the peak of our busy season approaching I will most likely be picking up another G-2 unless someone here can convince me that this piece of shit
is somehow superior.

Zwilling J.A. Henckels is probably the best bang for your buck. You can get a super high quality 8" chef's knife from them for around $150, maybe less if you can find a sale. I have their Twin Four Star II chef knife and have not had to send it out for sharpening once in the 5 years I have had it. Regular honing keeps it working perfectly. Pic related.

And anyone who tells you that Japanese knives are sharper, they are full of shit. Henckels uses a 15% edge angle which is the same as a Jung or other overpriced Japanese chef's knife. German engineering is GOAT.

15 degree... not percent.

Victronox or Global are the best personally,

It's all we use at work

>measuring your brands by how "sharp" they come out of the box
Reminder that people who buy german knives know most of what they "know" based on the Macy's cutlery catalog
>muh full tang
>muh rivets
>muh ice hardening

isn't the major difference between east and west knives is the east sharpen only one side?

No, and while we're at it let's dispense with a few more:
>folded a gorillion times: no
>made of pig iron: no
>always rat-tail tang: no
>always paper-thin and fragile: no
>always 12.000.000 JPY: no
Comparing "east" and "west" knives doesn't make sense. The comparison most people are really making is between mid-market Solingen knives and mid-market Japanese knives. The key difference is that mid-market Solingen knives are all fairly similar to one another whereas mid-market Japanese knives take design cues from literally everyone: Chinese, Germans, French, Americans, and, of course, Japanese

Get yourself either a Tojiro dp 210-240mm gyuto
>amazon.com/Tojiro-DP-Gyutou-8-2-21cm/dp/B000UAPQGS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1471566002&sr=8-1&keywords=tojiro dp

or a K Sabatier in stainless
>amazon.com/French-Sabatier-Forged-Stainless-Knife/dp/B007NZMKHQ/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1471565949&sr=8-4&keywords=k sabatier

Both of these knives are classic and extremely versatile blade shapes and made by respected brands. Japanese wa handles are a meme in my opinion and a nice western handle just appeals to my sensibilities so much more and are better when cutting up something sloppy for a long time.

Or if you HAVE to go german, I learned on this guy. My dad has had his for ~30 years and he gave me one when I was learning to cook in college. They are tanks, but they dont really cut as cleanly and the bolster can get annoying when you resharpen it on a stone.
>amazon.com/ZWILLING-J-Henckels-Four-Star-8-inch/dp/B00004RFKS/ref=sr_1_4?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1471566143&sr=1-4&keywords=zwilling j.a. henckels

I don't recommend buying a knife over $100 until you know what you are doing and you don't need to ask people for advice. Save that fancy custom kiritsuke with the powdered steel with the fukkin sick pattern weld for another day, my man.

You're a fucking idiot.

webstaurantstore.com/2835/chef-knives.html?vendor=Victorinox&gclid=CjwKEAjwudW9BRDcrd30kovf8GkSJAB3hTxFuRhKuZV_ZQhRbA2RswY_grY9R9EbSEY_ViTDRfmnaRoCSfDw_wcB
Third one on the list like 45 bucks had mine for about a year and a half with the fibrox handle

Learn how to sharpen freehand first or any money invested into a chef's knife will be money wasted.

People who don't know how to sharpen their knives on a whetstone should stick to $2 Walmart knives.

>knives have tribal tattoos now
are they gluten free though?

> Not reading the original post
Anyone with experience with a good quality german knife knows that they come sharp and stay sharp for a very long time before needing to be sharpened. They hold an edge VERY well. The only people who think Japanese knives are better are weebs who think >muh samurai steel.

I disagree completely. Perfect sharpening is a trade that takes time to master. Get a good knife that doesn't need to be sharpened often and when it does need to be sharpened once every several years, have it done professionally.

>he thinks Japanese knives are made of pig iron from some Japanese riverbed and smelted in a furnace by hand by an elderly Japanese gentleman
Please. German knives were always the poorfag's choice. They were the knockoffs of Sheffield knives. Sadly for the German knife industry, they were a one-trick pony and they're going the way of Detroit. Better metallurgy came along. This better metallurgy is no state secret. Japan does it. Sweden does it. America does it. But Germans are obstinate retards and refuse. They're trying to sell outdated, wallowing, low-tech luxo-barges in a world of Priuses and Teslas, and shrieking like a spoiled toddler when anyone suggests that they perhaps consider they get with the times

MAKE SOLINGEN GREAT AGAIN shrieked the Wusthof fag, before bashing another tomato into pulp with the least blunt edge of his teutonic meat axe

Get a good vintage carbon steel knife and restore it yourself.

>Once every several years

Hello non-sharpening plebfriend.

A regularly used home chef's knife needs to either be touched up at least weekly or sharpened at least monthly to not become butter knife dull.

Thinking that any knife could go SEVERAL YEARS between sharpenings just admits that you've no idea what you are talking about and have never handled an actually sharp knife.

That's okay though, most people have never used an actually sharp knife either, plebfriend.

This better metallurgy that is so common. Care to share a link?

Are you using a knife made of styrophome? I use my chef's knife a few times a week, hone before every use, and take good care of it. I have never had to have it sharpened and it can still slice a tomato so thin you can see through it.

If you sharpen your knife weekly in a few years youll be out of steel.

Or are you one of those plebs who doesn't know the difference between honing and sharpening?

>teutonic meat axe
nice, gonna start calling all my knives that

hitachi-metals.co.jp/e/products/
e-tokko.com/
uddeholm.com/
home.sandvik/en/

I'd start with Victorinox or Ikea. Güde if you want to spend more for something cool, albeit many of them do not have too much of a practical advantage over a recent Victorinox or Ikea knife.

You could also go with some Japanese knife (of which there are quite many good ones, stainless or not). Amazon.jp or japanesechefsknife definitely already have a lot of good ones with okay prices.

But most of the Japanese knifes will come with an implicit requirement to have *more* than one sharpening stone to maintain well over time.

I agree with this.

I hone my knives almost every time I use them.

I sharpen once or twice per year.

Plenty sharp for all cooking tasks.

I wish I had a sharp knife.
I basically hate to brute force my way through a beef brisket earlier so I could dice it up for my stew.

Someone asking what their first chef's knife should be shouldn't be buying a $700 micro-carbide knife. A good quality stainless steel knife in the 50-150 range is what he should be looking for.

This is true. The German brands that do sell the most technologically advanced knives manufacture them in Japan. Only the traditionally made knives are made in Germany.

(cont'd)
By the way, the small Vic pairing knifes (extremely brilliant, these cheap things!) and a bigger Güde pairing knife see as much use as the Chef's knife in my kitchen.

Maybe you already have knifes like that, but I'd simply suggest to not JUST get a Chef's knife.

>german knife shilling intensifies
Where do you krauts come up with this shit?

Just give it up Hermann, it's all over. Germany on suicide watch.

>The German brands that do sell the most technologically advanced knives manufacture them in Japan.
Nah, the genuine Solingen knifes are just as "modern" in many instances, even if they also do more traditional designs. Pic related, best bread knife I know (though arguably too expensive for most people, get a genuine Swiss Victorinox if you want great but not quite as big and expensive).

Not too few of the mass market brands have their knifes manufactured in Japan though, sure.

How was I shilling german knives in that post?

The knife in your image is not made with the newfangled steel you like to shill, it is a cheap stamped knife that you can find manufactured anywhere in the world.

But no it has a Japanese name so it must be superior. Nice weeb.

Honing only works on under-hardened German knives, and you'd be much better off doing a brief touch up on a proper abrasive than trying to use a honing rod, particularly if you buy properly hardened cutlery.

Honing just uses a hard surface to try and forcibly realigned the microscopically rolled portions of thr apex back into a straight line.

As you might imagine, the repeated plastic deformation inflicted on an apex is not very good for its strength, snd in any case, knives hardened above ~60 HRC are likely to microscopically chip fairly severely at the apex if you attempt to "hone" them.

Also, if you learn to sharpen properly, sharpening removes only a few microns of steel and it would take several thousand hand sharpenings to consume the blade.

The ability to slice a tomato only says your knife is not butter knife dull, but not that it is sharp. Cleanly slicing raw proteins (especially raw chicken) is a much better test of sharpness.

In any case, buying expensive cutlery is a total waste unless you plan to maintain the edge, as the vast majority of the cost is in the steel and heat treatment you won't be taking advantage of.

You'd be better off buying the cheapest thinnest knives you can get and just throwing them away at least yearly, rather than spending hundreds on a knife you will never see the true performance of.

>VG-10 is not a newfangled steel
Amazing, you managed to be a luddite and an insufferable steel-of-the-week cutlery hipster, both at the same time!

>Learn how to remove a few atoms of steel at a time from a knife before you buy your first knife.

>As you might imagine, the repeated plastic deformation inflicted on an apex is not very good for its strength, snd in any case, knives hardened above ~60 HRC are likely to microscopically chip fairly severely at the apex if you attempt to "hone" them.

Part one is incorrect. Honing a blade has no negative impact on its strength..
Part two is correct, knives that hard need to be sharpened more frequently which is one reason they are less suited to home cooks.

>Also, if you learn to sharpen properly, sharpening removes only a few microns of steel and it would take several thousand hand sharpenings to consume the blade.

This is a skill that takes time to master. Unless OP wants to take a knife sharpening class before buying a knife, he should get one that requires sharpening less often. A novice sharpening a blade is likely to fuck up the edge angle at best.

>The ability to slice a tomato only says your knife is not butter knife dull, but not that it is sharp. Cleanly slicing raw proteins (especially raw chicken) is a much better test of sharpness.
Bullshit. Slicing through a tomato skin requires a sharp blade to not mash the tomato. Raw protein can be pushed through with a dull blade by applying enough force.

r8 my knives

Tojiro - Why not. Useful.
Other two - don't care, probably paid too much.

So please explain the physical mechanism by which a honing rod works if it is not plastic deformation, and if you admit it is plastic deformation, explain how the repeated plastic deformation of a metal won't weaken it in a manner akin to bending a coat hanger wire back and forth causes it to weaken and then ultimately fail.

Learning to sharpen on a whetstone is not that hard, there are very good tutorials on YouTube.

Also, the difference in edge retention between the least and most wear resistant steels in at best ~2 or 3 to one, so spending big money on a knife that will be dull as shit in a few extra months is silly.

The thinnest cheapest knife you can get is always the right answer for people who don't sharpen because the cheap thin knives at least have a thin geometry to cut with when dull.

I said slicing raw proteins, not pushing through. I can make clean slices length wise through a raw chicken breast like a sushi chef with a yangiba because my knives are kept sharp as fuck.

Classical steeling rods were not smooth, it's always been intended a combo of burnishing and honing. Modern ceramic and diamond covered steels do it even better.

You're wrong. Modern abrasive 'steels' are sharpening tools made to look like honing steels because they're made for hipsters who think it's traditional.

An actual honing steel is, indeed, not smooth though. It has longitudinal ridges which are intended to contact the end of the blade at a shallow angle and comb any deformation out of the edge of the blade.

>comb any deformation out of the edge of the blade.

No, they work like a file. They remove metal from the blade. You can clearly see this on antique carving sets like pic related. See how the edge of the knife has so much metal removed from it?

forgot my pic like a tard

>lassical steeling rods were not smooth

Correct. Here's a closeup of one that's roughly 100 years old. Notice the serrations.

Modern ones might be ceramic abrasive or diamond-coated steel. In any case they are abrasive and remove small amounts of metal from the blade.

You literally can't buy it. Find me one on ebay and I'll back off.
Chefs knives are all around useless garbage with no real life applications besides full heads of lettuce, which you should be dismantling and washing before you cut anyways.

Someone please explain why a 3.5 inch wide easily dulled blade that you have to treat like a two year old child is better than a 3/4 inch wide serrated knife that needs no maintenance?
Have you ever chopped a raw steak? An onion? Why use a slippery blade that doesn't grab, increasing your risk of injury?

I am quite happy with deli/serrated, so please, read global rule 3 and fuck off will you?

>better than a 3/4 inch wide serrated knife

Serrated knives are useless for many cooking tasks. They don't work for chopping and force you to use a slicing motion instead. That's much slower, They're also impractical to use for small delicate tasks like mincing garlic or herbs.

>>Have you ever chopped a raw steak? An onion?
Yes, many times. I chop raw steak to make tartare. I chop raw pork to make mapo tofu, or if I want to make a little breakfast sausage and don't feel like breaking out and cleaning the meat grinder. These tasks are much easier with a straight edged knife.

>Why use a slippery blade that doesn't grab, increasing your risk of injury?
I agree user, dull knives are not only ineffective, but dangerous.

this is all that you need

amazon.com/Shun-DM0712-Classic-Chinese-Vegetable/dp/B0000Y7L6W

German knives have their place. Personally I use a Henckels pro chef knife for heavy chopping or breaking down things like large squashes. I like the weight and balance for those types of jobs although that's obviously personal preference.

When I'm doing more fine slicing or working with meats and fish I break out a Yoshihiro gyuto knife.

Generally japanese knives hold a sharper edge for longer but are lighter and less comfortable to work with. German knives are more comfortable and require less maintenance. They can get by with a few runs across a honing rod before use and don't need to be whetstone sharpened as often.

I don't mess with garlic and herbs but I can see a straight edge being better. I have tremors and find the serrations make it much safer to cut onions, the sawing motion really isn't necessary, one draw backwards and it cuts clean.
The knife I posted does have 1 inch unserrated on the tip, which I use for those finer cuts like pepper ribs or steak trimming. It's not really visible but it gets used.
I'm too twitchy and stuck in my ways to bother with my chef's knife, I only use knives for vegetables and steak. Try chopping baby carrots with a sharp chef's knife for the lulz.

>German knives have their place.

I agree. It's not a question of one being better than the other, it's a matter of balancing pros and cons.

The (generally) softer steel and thicker blade of the German style knife makes it more durable. If I have to break down a bunch of chickens & chop the carcass up for stock I want a knife that I can just chop down wherever and not worry about chipping it on bone. For that application I'll choose a German style knife any day.

OTOH if I'm slicing vegetables then I'm going to reach for the thinner and sharper Jap style knife.

It's like saying which is better: a ferrari or a cargo van? The choice depends entirely on the application. I wouldn't want to take a date out in a cargo van, nor would I want to move using a ferrari.

>Can't sharpen a knife

>The knife in your image is not made with the newfangled steel you like to shill
Yes it is you retard.
>it is a cheap stamped knife that you can find manufactured anywhere in the world.
No. It's a powder-steel core with a softer clading. You're a retard and know nothing. Now please go.

>So please explain the physical mechanism by which a honing rod works if it is not plastic deformation, and if you admit it is plastic deformation, explain how the repeated plastic deformation of a metal won't weaken it in a manner akin to bending a coat hanger wire back and forth causes it to weaken and then ultimately fail.
There is something called a fatigue threshold. You can have plastic deformation without fatigue, you can have non-permanent deformation _with_ fatigue and any other combination of the three. They are unrealted. But as user said, it's not all just banging the steel back into shape. Most rods actually remove a fair bit of material. Optimaly just the weakened false edge you're so worried about.

>I don't mess with garlic and herbs
So you don't cook. Opinion discarded. Go play with your serrated knives somewhere safe.

>I dont mess with garlic or herbs
oh wow

Why do you think you have an opinion that matters?

Don't know about the Tojiro but
Good taste/10

I have zero access to fresh herbs in the Appalachian mountains without growing them myself. Zero.
And why would I need a whole clove of garlic for ANYTHING being a lone male that cooks big meals 5 times a month?
If you can't get by with salt, pepper and parsley then maybe you should stop drinking vodka and smoking marlboros all day?

Oh good the Chinese cleaver shills are here. I was wondering where you were.

> Doesn't like flavor
> Posts on a cooking forum

wait what? There's SMOOTH honing steels now?
BWAHAHAHAAAAHAHAHHAH*cough*AAAAAAAAAHAHHAAAAAAAA IDIOTS

>Comes to knife thread
>Doesn't cook

>overpowering every single meal you eat 3 times a day for 3 months per clove of garlic
>flavortown

Maybe you missed the part where I am a lone male.

>2016
>using parsley for anything other than ironic garnishing

nigga. It's not the 80's anymore.

>Appalachian mountains

I thought you guys had all kinds of wild edible plants and herbs in your area?

I watched a TV program with Sean Brock a while back. He grew up there, and was constantly talking about how his mother would collect various wild herbs & plants to cook with. Several were shown on the program. (Mind of a Chef).

> Doesn't know the difference between a clove of garlic and a bulb of garlic
> Posts on a cooking forum

>Maybe you missed the part where I am a lone male.

Why would that matter? I'm a lone male. Doesn't stop me from using fresh garlic, herbs, etc. Why not take pride in the food you make for yourself? Why not make yourself better, tastier food than basic shit?

>I am a lone male.
Trust me, user. No-one has mistaken you for anything else. Now leave this nice knife thread to the neurotypical adults would you? You get five good-boy points if you do.

You are scraping it across the acute edge (ridge) of a substantially harder material. It always was essentially a file, especially with the classical super-soft knives.

As for sharpening rods being for hipsters, it's easier to maintain an angle on a rod held vertically than freehanding on a stone.

Only a couple things here. Everything is harvested for money in rural wv by the suboxin/subutex abusers. You're not even likely to find mint leaves.

Not to mention how much faster it is for a quick touch up than breaking out a stone.

bitch if you don't throw some seed out in the yard...

Posters: 39

Posters: 39

So this leads me to believe that
Samefag.
Why the fuck didn't you go to school today user?
Global rule 3.

Only one that was me. The rest might be samefag though.

I am fairly confident that an apex that has rolled enough to be significantly realigned by a honing rod has exceeded the fatigue threshold. Also, I'm aware that most honing rods abrade to some degree, I just think that it isn't worth the burnishing and plastic deformation, both of which weaken the apex, when there are much better alternatives available.

A leather bench strop pasted with a coarse particulate abrasive would do a far better job at touching up an apex by abrasion while minimizing burnishing and plastic deformation.

For that matter, so would regular touchups on a high grit waterstone.

The later two would also be the only practical options for higher hardness blades anyway.

nice try.

for the record, im gettin day drunk because I work for myself and fridays can go fuck themselves.

You're wrong on this too, no-herbs-or-spices-cooks-with-serrated-granny-blade-kun. Nice trainwreck you have going here. I understand why you have to live far out in the sticks, away from people.

Almost

>he thinks everyone who disagrees with him is a samefag