Another Pink World

About

« the triumvarate of power | Main | hm. »

January 26, 2004

knife advice

my kitchen lacks a tool that no kitchen should lack-- a decent knife. i have a set of steak knives that includes what is probably supposed to be a vegetable cleaver, but is actually just a super-sized steak knife. that's about it in the knife department. they cut things, and they are an improvent over what i had before (three small, flimsy steak knives from my mother's attic), but they're not a lot of fun to use.

i find the whole nice knife thing really baffling. i think my stepfather knows a lot about this subject, but every time i try to ask him about it, he seems to assume that i know as much as he does, which doesn't help me much. he has thrown a brand name or two at me, but i can never remember what they are (i'm much better at remembering if i see something written down).

so, given that we seem to have some kitchen-savvy folks reading this blog, i'm interested in your advice. i want to get one nice knife. maybe, eventually, more than one. what should i get?

i've also realized that my vintage grater just doesn't work for grating finely. it's great (hah!) for slices and fat grates, but not for, say, ginger. i can't really justify having two graters (and actually, right now i do have two graters, so really three), so it'll probably have to go. which makes me kinda sad. i like getting use out of vintage implements.

Posted by lisa at January 26, 2004 02:30 PM | TrackBack

Comments

I am eagerly awaiting Joe's guidance in this department! (The first time I met him on the streets of Durham, he had just received a trunkload of new knives.)

Posted by: Phil on January 26, 2004 02:53 PM

in graters, i'm told it's all about microplane. we don't have one. yet. but i've read that they're state of the art in grating technology.
as for knives. the brandnames i rate highest are: henckels, wusthof, global. not necessarily in that order. globals are dead sexy but also more spendy. i don't know about wusthof but i know that henckels has budget product lines -- they still have the henckels name but aren't as high quality.
i know there's an episode of "good eats" where he talks about what to look for in a knife but i can't find anything helpful on either food network or alton's website.
this site seems to cover the basics pretty well tho
http://www.sharpknives.com/how_to_choose_the_appropriate_kitchen_knives.htm
follow up: here's another article
http://www.charleston.net/stories/100803/foo_08knives.shtml

Posted by: georg on January 26, 2004 03:02 PM

Geez, Phil, don't people meet in the strangest ways? And I'd'a' thought roaming around Durham with a trunk full of big knives would scare people off.

Anyway, Georg is right: Microplane rocks. If you poke around at http://www.microplane.com/ you can even find their power surgical tool line -- not for the squeamish. They don't retail directly, but lots of places sell them. The Microplane I have is a set from Lee Valley: http://www.leevalley.com/garden/page.asp?page=32458&category=2,40733,44734&abspage=1&ccurrency=2&SID= It's a little narrow, but it comes with a box that holds the grated substance; the box doubles as a holder for the blade when not in use.

Wusthof, Henckels, Global -- I've never seen a bad Wusthof. The knife I use the most is my 8-inch Wusthof chef's knife. They're not cheap, but they're not the most expensive either. Global is supposed to be nice, but they're really expensive -- maybe because they're trendy right now. I've never used one, unfortunately. Some Henckels stuff is nice, but then some of those fine "German" knives are made in China [not that there's anything wrong with China :) ] out of thin steel that doesn't seem like much. Make sure you know what you're buying.

A nice deal I found a couple months ago for a good, inexpensive set of knives is another Lee Valley thing: http://www.leevalley.com/gifts/page.asp?page=48660&category=4%2C104%2C45477&ccurrency=2&SID= However, it looks like Lee Valley has run out since the last time I checked, and isn't taking back orders. I gave two sets for $mas, and both recipients were happy. (Phil, ask Claire what she thought: I showed her a set.) Lee Valley also carries other stuff from $3 paring knives to a serious $75 10-inch Thiers-Issard chef's knife. They're great to deal with too. If any of you local folks want something from them but don't want to pay full shipping, let me know; I'll stick it on my next order and split the shipping out pro rata. They also have a lot of knife information on their web site if you root around a little bit.

And now for something completely different: if any of you have $300 to blow, take a look at Kyocera's KYOTOP ceramic knives: http://www.kyoceratycom.com/FineCeramics/Products/kitchen_wood.htm Buy me one while you're at it. I have one on my Amazon Wishlist, but no one's bitten yet. :)

Shouldn't I be putting all this on that food blog I'm going to start any day now?

Posted by: Joseph H. Vilas on January 27, 2004 01:15 AM

I think I'll try this again, if no one minds. :)

If I were going to buy one knife for myself, it'd probably be an 8-inch chef's knife. I'd want it to have steel running all the way through the handle, with the handle made of wood or comfortable plastic. The knife blade should be tapered from its spine to its edge; the back should be relatively thick: at least 1/8 inch near the handle. Some people like high-carbon steel, but I believe most stainless knives are high-carbon, and stainless is much easier to take care of. The knife is not serrated, either coarsely or finely.

I don't own this exact knife, but given my penchant for Lee Valley these days, I'd probably try one of these: http://leevalley.com/garden/page.asp?page=45509 . The manufacturer is the French company Thiers-Issard, who sells their knives under the name "Sabatier" everywhere except the U.S., where the word "Sabatier" is someone else's trademark. The 8-inch is $54.50. The 6-inch is $42.50 if you want something smaller.

Make sure you have a wooden or plastic cutting board. Cutting on harder surfaces can damage your knife.

Next, I'd make sure your knife had somewhere to live where it wouldn't get beat up. This could be a knife block, an edge guard, or maybe just a special, convenient place in your kitchen. An edge guard can be the spine from one of those plastic binders, or you can buy one cheaply. Edge guard or no, I still wouldn't let it bang around with a bunch of other stuff, and I probably wouldn't put the knife in a dishwasher.

Next, figure out how to sharpen your knife when it gets dull. This is important: if you don't do this, you will eventually stop using your knife and be dissatisfied with it. I could talk about this for a really long time, but there are basically three things you could do: (1) Find someone else to sharpen it; (2) buy a stone and learn to use it; (3) buy a jig and learn to use it. What's important about picking between these three is that you actualy be comfortable with doing it. (1) costs money ($3-$5 bucks a pop) and is inconvenient, especialy if you only have one knife. You also have to trust them. (2) is scary to a lot of people, but is probably the cheapest long-term route; the stone to buy is probably a 1000 grit artificial waterstone. You can buy or make a simple jig to position the knife on the stone (in fact clipping the plastic binder/knife guard to the blade back may work ok), or you can freehand it. (3) There are a bunch of those ceramic (or metal) things one draws a knife through to sharpen it, but they can damage knives and tend to make the edge very obtuse. There's a jig by a company named Gatco that clamps onto the knife. It has multiple stones with it and lets you pick the angle. It can be slow, and you'll spend $25 to $55 or more.

You can put off sharpening your knife by buying a knife steel and learning to use it. Steeling will help maintain the knife, but eventually steeling won't help any more. So maybe you'd want to buy a steel before getting a sharpening setup.

Sharpening information: Most of what I've learned came from The Complete Guide to Sharpening, by Leonard Lee: http://amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1561581259/ . The book has a lot of technical information, which I like. It's oriented toward woodworking tools, but has a section on kitchen knives. You can also buy this book from Lee Valley: the author is the founder of the company.

After I had a good chef's knife, a way to protect it, and a way to sharpen it, I think I'd buy a cheap vegetable peeler and a large, cheap serrated knife. Mine cost about $3 altogether. Then I'd buy a smallish knife, maybe a paring knife (especially if I didn't have or like a vegetable peeler) or a boning knife.

After that, I think what you'd buy depends on what you've been buying and what you've been doing with them.

Posted by: Joseph H Vilas on February 1, 2004 12:53 PM

wow, joe-- that was exactly what i was looking for. thank you.

now the irony is... i bought an expensive vegetable peeler a year or so ago, love it more than almost any other tool in my kitchen, and that's what inspired me to finally do something about the knife situation.

i have to admit that the sharpening issue is intimidating. my uncle showed me how to use a stone a long time ago, but it has been many years. oh well-- just something new to learn :)

Posted by: lisa on February 1, 2004 01:06 PM

As long as you have a vegetable peeler you like, good. My cheap one works better than the couple "nice" ones I've bought. Guess I was just lucky.

I forgor to mention graters: I used a cheap metal box grater for a long time. I still have it, and wouldn't do without it. But (as you noted) they don't work well for ginger, nutmeg and some hard cheeses. The Microplane I bought for those uses is about $9, or $13 with the holder. I love it for spices, Parmesan cheese, and other recalcitrant comestibles. It's all stainless and can go in the dishwasher.

The sharpening thing is intimidating, which is why it's good to be comfortable with whatever it is you wind up doing. I first paid someone to sharpen my knives; they did a good job and did it cheaply. Then they quit their business. So I bought the Gatco thing and used it for a long time. Now I have a machine for both my woodworking tools and my knives.

As far as equipment goes, I can loan you the proper waterstone if you want to try it. Oilstones of the right grit are fine too if they're not worn out. I think I can re-condition a worn-out oilstone now, but I haven't tried yet. I can also loan you a knife steel (when I get it back from its current borrower) or my Gatco kit. I can also sharpen your knife on my machine, and even show you how to do it, but my house is a mess right now. :)

Posted by: Joseph H Vilas on February 1, 2004 01:26 PM

man, that is a lotta stuff to know about knives.

thanks for the offer of knife-sharpening instruction! since i don't yet have a knife, and it will be a while after i get it before it needs sharpening, i think you have time to get your place cleaned up before i try to take you up on that :) though, for the record, i don't actually give a damn about that kind of thing.

Posted by: lisa on February 1, 2004 07:36 PM

So, if I can plug myself, so to speak? I re-assembled the information I wrote up for you, added more, and put in more links:

http://jhv.blogs.com/eatatjoes/2004/06/knives.html

I'm going to try to update it as I think of more stuff. But it's already pretty freaking long.

Posted by: Joseph H. Vilas on July 4, 2004 02:53 PM

Post a comment