First time Japanese Gyuto for a friend - need your advice

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The wife of a very good friend of mine wants to give him his first "real" knife. He has a couple of the usual German suspects ...

She has no idea (yet) so I offered to give her 3 recommendations at 3 different price points. Please see the questionnaire:

LOCATION
What country are you in?



KNIFE TYPE
What type of knife are you interested in (e.g., chef’s knife, slicer, boning knife, utility knife, bread knife, paring knife, cleaver)?

Are you right or left handed?

Are you interested in a Western handle (e.g., classic Wusthof handle) or Japanese handle?

What length of knife (blade) are you interested in (in inches or millimeters)?

Do you require a stainless knife? (Yes or no)

What is your absolute maximum budget for your knife?



KNIFE USE
Do you primarily intend to use this knife at home or a professional environment?

HOME

What are the main tasks you primarily intend to use the knife for

Looking for versatile knife. He would use it a lot as a meat slicer, but also for veggie prep

What knife, if any, are you replacing?

Couple of Henckels and the likes ... he intends to keep them, but wants one really nice knife (little does he know that this will just be the beginning LOL)

Do you have a particular grip that you primarily use?

To be honest, I haven't seen him cut ... I think hammer.

What cutting motions do you primarily use? (Please click on this LINK for types of cutting motions and identify the two or three most common cutting motions, in order of most used to least used.)

Slice, rock, dice

What improvements do you want from your current knife?

Sharper (haha), good to great edge retention ... a higher quality knife. It needs to be really sharp OOTB for him, he doesn't sharpen himself and I think he'd be disappointed it it won't be by far the sharpest knife he ever touched. He thinks taking care of a knife is not putting it in the dishwasher. So I think this needs to be a stainless. He's not ready yet for Carbon.

Not the Laser type of guy. Knife can be of medium to higher weight. Little wedging more important than food release ...



KNIFE MAINTENANCE

Synthetic board

Do you sharpen your own knives?

He does ... but it hurts to look at them. One of those nasty pull through things. Therefore I feel that edge retention is really important and I will try to convince him to get it professionally sharpened from time to time ...

If not, are you interested in learning how to sharpen your knives? (Yes or no.)

Negative at this point

Are you interested in purchasing sharpening products for your knives? (Yes or no.)

No



SPECIAL REQUESTS/COMMENTS

He wants a 240mm Gyuto ... From my point of view this needs to be stainless, with good to great edge retention. Versatile profile with a bit of belly.

Two special requests: Ideally I can give his wife three recommendations, one each for less than $100, between $120-150 and around $200.

Birthday is in 6 weeks, so ordering from Japan would be an option as well.

Last but not least, he is kind of odd in the sense that he LOVES to score bargains. He would happily spend more on something if he feels that he's getting a great deal (A Sale junkie). So if this knife qualifies as "Great bang for your buck" knife ... it'd be his kind of gift ...
 
Not sure why the first couple are empty ... so here's the rest:

LOCATION
What country are you in?

USA

KNIFE TYPE
What type of knife are you interested in

Gyuto

Are you right or left handed?

Right

Are you interested in a Western handle (e.g., classic Wusthof handle) or Japanese handle?

Both

What length of knife (blade) are you interested in (in inches or millimeters)?

240 mm

Do you require a stainless knife? (Yes or no)

Yes, or semi

What is your absolute maximum budget for your knife?

$200


The wife of a very good friend of mine wants to give him his first "real" knife. He has a couple of the usual German suspects ...

She has no idea (yet) so I offered to give her 3 recommendations at 3 different price points. Please see the questionnaire:

LOCATION
What country are you in?



KNIFE TYPE
What type of knife are you interested in (e.g., chef’s knife, slicer, boning knife, utility knife, bread knife, paring knife, cleaver)?

Are you right or left handed?

Are you interested in a Western handle (e.g., classic Wusthof handle) or Japanese handle?

What length of knife (blade) are you interested in (in inches or millimeters)?

Do you require a stainless knife? (Yes or no)

What is your absolute maximum budget for your knife?



KNIFE USE
Do you primarily intend to use this knife at home or a professional environment?

HOME

What are the main tasks you primarily intend to use the knife for

Looking for versatile knife. He would use it a lot as a meat slicer, but also for veggie prep

What knife, if any, are you replacing?

Couple of Henckels and the likes ... he intends to keep them, but wants one really nice knife (little does he know that this will just be the beginning LOL)

Do you have a particular grip that you primarily use?

To be honest, I haven't seen him cut ... I think hammer.

What cutting motions do you primarily use? (Please click on this LINK for types of cutting motions and identify the two or three most common cutting motions, in order of most used to least used.)

Slice, rock, dice

What improvements do you want from your current knife?

Sharper (haha), good to great edge retention ... a higher quality knife. It needs to be really sharp OOTB for him, he doesn't sharpen himself and I think he'd be disappointed it it won't be by far the sharpest knife he ever touched. He thinks taking care of a knife is not putting it in the dishwasher. So I think this needs to be a stainless. He's not ready yet for Carbon.

Not the Laser type of guy. Knife can be of medium to higher weight. Little wedging more important than food release ...



KNIFE MAINTENANCE

Synthetic board

Do you sharpen your own knives?

He does ... but it hurts to look at them. One of those nasty pull through things. Therefore I feel that edge retention is really important and I will try to convince him to get it professionally sharpened from time to time ...

If not, are you interested in learning how to sharpen your knives? (Yes or no.)

Negative at this point

Are you interested in purchasing sharpening products for your knives? (Yes or no.)

No



SPECIAL REQUESTS/COMMENTS

He wants a 240mm Gyuto ... From my point of view this needs to be stainless, with good to great edge retention. Versatile profile with a bit of belly.

Two special requests: Ideally I can give his wife three recommendations, one each for less than $100, between $120-150 and around $200.

Birthday is in 6 weeks, so ordering from Japan would be an option as well.

Last but not least, he is kind of odd in the sense that he LOVES to score bargains. He would happily spend more on something if he feels that he's getting a great deal (A Sale junkie). So if this knife qualifies as "Great bang for your buck" knife ... it'd be his kind of gift ...
 
^^^ What he said. For mid range gessin stainless seems popular. For high end if go masakage but that's probably a tad over 200. The mizu and yuki lines are suberb ootb but are carbon. Albeit carbon wrapped in stainless. I have the mizu and its super easy to take care of. If you order from knifewear ( might be cheaper given how ****** the cad dollar is it comes with a pamplet telling you not to be stupid with your knife). Even my 70 year old grandpa can use it.
 
^^^ What he said. For mid range gessin stainless seems popular. For high end if go masakage but that's probably a tad over 200. The mizu and yuki lines are suberb ootb but are carbon. Albeit carbon wrapped in stainless. I have the mizu and its super easy to take care of. If you order from knifewear ( might be cheaper given how ****** the cad dollar is it comes with a pamplet telling you not to be stupid with your knife). Even my 70 year old grandpa can use it.

I have a Yuki Nakiri and I feel it's as easy to take care of as Carbon knives come. And it's a beauty! Would've been in the price range with their February Masakage sale, I guess ...
 
I would suggest something like a Gesshin Kagero for the higher end of the series. It's stainless, pm steel (holds edge forever), and will be easy to adapt to as the profile is not too flat coming from German knives (though most everything will be an adjustment). The price is ~230 which is close, but the performance including oob edge (if you get Jon to sharpen it) will be sharper than anything he's used prior. Oh yes, it comes with a case...
 
I would suggest something like a Gesshin Kagero for the higher end of the series. It's stainless, pm steel (holds edge forever), and will be easy to adapt to as the profile is not too flat coming from German knives (though most everything will be an adjustment). The price is ~230 which is close, but the performance including oob edge (if you get Jon to sharpen it) will be sharper than anything he's used prior. Oh yes, it comes with a case...


I've never used powdered steel ... does it generally hold the edge longer than other stainless steels?
 
Quite a bit longer; I sharpen my pm steel knives once for every 2-3 sharpening sessions on other SS knives.
 
The usual suspects . . .

- Tojiro DP
- Fujiwara FKM
- Masamoto VG
- MAC Pro

Also +1 on the Kagero - the PM steel is hardened to about 64 HrC and will retain its edge significantly longer. might be more chip prone but SRS15 is supposed to be more resistant than other PM steels.
 
I'll suggest a couple at the lower end of your spectrum. Gesshin stainless from JKI or Suisin Western Inox from Korin. Either would likely be the best knive he's ever used. And you're not going to do better at that price point. Would agree with CCats at the upper end of your range but IMO a non-knife geek is going to hit that point of diminishing returns around $100. I think the Suisin looks a little nicer, the Gesshin is a little nicer. Difference in price is noise.

To cheaply up the wow factor if you buy from Korin they will engrave any art you provide or a simple HBD and date. That would be a nice touch for a birthday gift.

Good luck in finding the perfect gift.
 
Kagero. It's an extremely fine grain steel, as well as being stainless and having superior edge retention. Maintenance will be less (and therefor less costly), sharpness will be WOW. He just needs to take care with it. It's tough, in relative terms, but can't be handled indiscriminately like his Henckles. Then again no decent knife could either.


Rick
 
Tojiro DP is great. I just got one for my mom and I am pleased with what I see.
 
I think Tojiro is a great choice, especially looking at the price point. I will suggest that one and that she should get him a Carbon Petty or something as a "throw in" and a cheap(er) way to get introduced to Carbon...
 
Would you people recommend a Corvette to someone who has to drive his car through a patch of corn fields to and from work everyday? Is common sense in short supply on KKF nowadays? :scratchhead:

Until said friend is willing to change his barbaric knife handling ways, I would recommend a decent Sabatier. Or a Global, which would be up for the abuse, if he truly must get his feet wet. Unless he dislikes the handle and profile.

There are other Japanese oriented knives in the $50ish range, but I can't remember off the top of my head, and I'm too lazy(drunk) to really care.
 
I don't know if this is a good recommendation or not but if it were me, I'd really be happy with hiromoto as as my first Japanese knife.
 
If your friend has no interest in stones or proper sharpening I dont even see the need for getting him any Jknife at all honestly. Dexter, Forschner, cheap stainless $30 cleaver would work...If you really think he wants to splurge get him a tojiro dp.
 
Ahahahaha, God love ya Chef Doom, I don't know about too lazy but you sure do appear to be too drunk when you wrote your comment, at the very least your readinng comp is impaired here.


Rick
 
If your friend has no interest in stones or proper sharpening I dont even see the need for getting him any Jknife at all honestly. Dexter, Forschner, cheap stainless $30 cleaver would work...If you really think he wants to splurge get him a tojiro dp.

It's the wife looking for a bday gift. Not sure a $30 beater replacing a $30 German knife would cut it for her [emoji6]

I can sharpen it for him...
 
Probably get flamed for this. but for the cheap suggestion look at the Richmond GT Artifex. It's a Fujiwara FKM blade (mentioned several times above) but with a wa-handle. I've been playing with a 210mm and can't think of a better overall "beginner" japanese knife for the price. For the mid-price suggestion I would look at the Tanaka VG10 damascus.

Oh, and your friend is going to have to do something about the sharpening. Find a sharpener here and give him the info. Knives must be sharpened periodically.
 
FWIW I'd recommend the Geshin stainless series over the Fujiwara/Artifex GT.


Rick
 
Gesshin Stainless is not a laser but not a fatty either. An inexpensive knife that can go all day. Feel like a broken record sometimes but for me, for 100 bucks, it's the Gesshin or the Suisin. End of story.

2015-04-26%2021.45.08.jpg


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Gesshin Stainless is not a laser but not a fatty either. An inexpensive knife that can go all day. Feel like a broken record sometimes but for me, for 100 bucks, it's the Gesshin or the Suisin. End of story.

2015-04-26%2021.45.08.jpg


2015-04-26%2021.49.51.jpg

I haven't tried a TON of knives, but I just bought a gesshin stainless 210 for my sister and it's an excellent knife for the money. F&F was excellent, and performance for the price was great. I would say the tojiro dp feels tougher and is much heavier, but head to head out of the box, the gesshin is better.
 
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