Former Chef in need of Knife Advice

Hello All, I'm new to the forums and it was suggested that I put together a "What Knife do I buy" post. As I am looking to get back into the culinary world, Unfortunate I'm sure things have changed alot since my departure 4 years ago as far as knives go so any advice would be great advice! Thank you in advance!

LOCATION
What country are you in?

USA "The City of Brotherly Love Philadelphia"


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)?

Chefs knife, Boning Knife, Paring Knife, Santoku or Deba,Cleaver, Fillet,

Are you right or left handed?

Righty

Are you interested in a Western handle or Japanese handle?

Japanese

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

180 MM Chef's

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

If would be nice due to being used in the kitchen but not a deal breaker

What is your absolute maximum budget for your knife?

Id like to spend around 700 for the full set I need , plus a roll

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

Professional

What are the main tasks you primarily intend to use the knife for (e.g., slicing vegetables, chopping vegetables, mincing vegetables, slicing meats, cutting down poultry, breaking poultry bones, filleting fish, trimming meats, etc.)?

Everything

What knife, if any, are you replacing?

Global Santoku and Chefs

Do you have a particular grip that you primarily use?

Pinch Grip

What cutting motions do you primarily use?

Rocking

What improvements do you want from your current knife?

Comfort,Sharpness, Edge rentention, Better Aesthetics



KNIFE MAINTENANCE
Do you use a bamboo, wood, rubber, or synthetic cutting board?

Yes

Do you sharpen your own knives?

Yes

If not, are you interested in learning how to sharpen your knives?

Yes

Are you interested in purchasing sharpening products for your knives?

Possibly

Very Partial gleistin knives, Misono, Global, Shun, and Masahiro. I really would like to be educated on great Japanese knives

It's tough to get that many knives within your total budget. Maybe prioritize and cut down a bit so you can spend a bit more on the important ones.

The most importent ones for me are The Chefs, Santoku/Deba, Paring and Boning Knife atm, The others can wait

If you are working in a professional kitchen methinks you may want more than a 180mm gyuto!

That was a Mistyped, 210" is what I'm aiming for . I have small hands :chin:

DravenX said:

The most importent ones for me are The Chefs, Santoku/Deba, Paring and Boning Knife atm, The others can wait

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Could you explain why you are grouping the deba and the santoku together?

What is your intended usage for each knife and are you sure that you need a fillet and a deba?

DravenX said:

That was a Mistyped, 210" is what I'm aiming for . I have small hands :chin:

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210"! That's 17.5 feet, I don't think there are any blades in existence which are so big!

On a more serious note, I would suggest you consider a 240mm - with a wa-handled knife it'll work out closer to 225mm heel to tip.

Well being used to Global Knives, I owned a Santoku Knife years ago recently, I have seen them advertised as a Deba Knife so thats why I included Santoku/Deba togeather in the post, I'm going to be using the knife for mainly doing vegetables and fruits as well as your usual prep work. Eventually I would like to get a Fillet Knife for breaking down whole fish when I need to. Maybe there's a misunderstanding on my part for thinking that a Santoku knife and a Deba Knife are the same thing. I know I'm probably coming off as being misinformed and I do apologize about that. That's one of the reasons I joined the forum was to get guidance and learn

MAS4T0 said:

Could you explain why you are grouping the deba and the santoku together?

What is your intended usage for each knife and are you sure that you need a fillet and a deba?



210"! That's 17.5 feet, I don't think there are any blades in existence which are so big!

On a more serious note, I would suggest you consider a 240mm - with a wa-handled knife it'll work out closer to 225mm heel to tip.

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Lol sorry, I'm just nervous being on here, I don't know a lot about knives =( I ment 210 mm lol. Its intimidating being around experts lol!!!!, whats a wa handled knife?

BTW MAS4T0 Nice avatar, I'm in the process of watching the full Naruto Series right now, I'm on episode 102 of Shippadin!!

DravenX said:

BTW MAS4T0 Nice avatar, I'm in the process of watching the full Naruto Series right now, I'm on episode 102 of Shippadin!!

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AWESOME! Hopefully you're watching it subtitled rather than dubbed, you need to get caught up ASAP and you're in for a treat as the early seasons are nothing compared to the later ones.

DravenX said:

Lol sorry, I'm just nervous being on here, I don't know a lot about knives =( I ment 210 mm lol. Its intimidating being around experts lol!!!!, whats a wa handled knife?

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Don't be, everyone is welcoming here.

A Wa handle is a traditional Japanese knife handle. The tang is relatively thin and short, with a handle which is drilled in the centre and then burnt or epoxied in place. The other type would be a western handle (Yo) where you usually have a full tang which extends through the handle and has scales attached to each side. The main difference in use is that a Wa handle is (usually) significantly lighter, making the knife lighter overall but also moving the balance point forward. With a Wa handled knife the blade is (usually) measured from the handle to the tip of the blade whereas on a western knife it is measured from the heel of the blade to the tip; the net result of this is that a Wa handled knife of the same nominal length will often be around 15mm shorter from heel to tip.

Here's an image of a Wa handled knife with the handle removed so that you can see the construction.

I'm really leaning towards a Gleistin Chefs knife because I've heard so many good things, however I want to get expert opinion before spending the money , Damascus blades have always intrigued me, I heard the VG10 steel that is normally used holds an edge very well. I've seen lots of beautiful knives on the forums already so. At this point I'm honestly looking for opinions on starting a new kit, I feel that if I'm spending the money I want to ensure that I have good tools. I do prefer the lightness of the global knives, So a Wa handle would probably be a good place to go , It seems to me that the Gleistin knife handle is similer to wustof or henckels

I think that you really do need to consider which knives you really need.

$700 can get you a great set if you keep it to a small number of knives and they'll hold their value, so if you'd like to make a change once you learn your preferences you would be able to trade them on here (in the BST section) for something which better suits you.

The only knives I really use are a parer (90mm), boner (150mm), petty (150mm) and gyuto (240mm). If I was in your situation I'd buy a cheap parer for the time being ($5), a Tojiro DP Boner ($70), a Mizuno petty ($135) and a Mizuno gyuto ($340) which total at $550 leaving plenty of change for the knife roll. You could also add a Mac bread knife ($90) and a cheap cleaver and still come in well below budget.

That is just an example and I'm not suggesting that you go with these specific knives, but unless you're doing a specific type of prep this kind of set should cover all bases and would mean that you could pick up an extremely good set and come in below budget. I guess the point I'm making is that you should probably look into spending about half of your budget on the gyuto as it is the knife you'll use 90% of the time and the one which will benefit most from the extra spend.

I'm just trying to refine down what you're needing so that we can give the best advice, suggesting a full set can be much harder if you don't know how you want to break down the budget or exactly how many knives you'll need.

Are you talking about Mizuno Tanrenjo knives or Misono's, Ive used a Misono UX10 before that was sharp as hell

DravenX said:

Are you talking about Mizuno Tanrenjo knives or Misono's, Ive used a Misono UX10 before that was sharp as hell

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Yeah, I was talking about Mizuno Tanrenjo.

I wasn't suggesting that you go with those specifically as they would likely be more reactive than you're looking for, I was making a point of how I would spread out the budget.

I took a look , He makes some killer looking knives, what do you mean by reactive? are there some other knife makers that you can recommend you take a look at?

DravenX said:

I took a look , He makes some killer looking knives, what do you mean by reactive? are there some other knife makers that you can recommend you take a look at?

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They're clad with iron which reacts with the acid in foods and patinas or rusts very quickly. When you cut food with it, the sides of the blade discolor almost instantly and you need to be very careful not to leave it wet or with food residue on it. There is a stainless gyuto available, but I think that it's a rebrand.

There are lots of great makers available. I'd recommend you check out Japanese Knife Imports, it's run by John who is a vendor on here and he has lots of great videos which might help you decide what you want in a gyuto.

It might be worth making a new thread specifically for the gyuto (once you figure out what you'd like to spend on that particular knife), as there are a lot of things to consider (how much belly, how pointy the tip, the thickness of the blade, the height of the blade, etc) and it is the blade you'll be using 90% of the time.

Thanks for the advice bro, I appreciate you bearing with me on this

DravenX said:

Thanks for the advice bro, I appreciate you bearing with me on this

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You're most welcome my friend.

Call Jon at Japanese Knife Imports, former chef, all around great guy.

I'm not a pro, but for what it is worth, some pro friends of mine use a mixture of cheaper (used to be Victorinox now the Wusthof line) knives for some things and saved money to use on the gyuto/line knifes

Victorinox boning and fish fillet knife. Cheaper if you get Fibrox handles both work well for their intended use.

Cleaver-Sugimoto CM 4030 108.97 Rakuten global market.

Prepping vegetables in a production kitchen a Santoku is too small. I have nothing against Santoku, but not for quantity prep work. I see a lot of students using 210mm chef knives, highly recommend getting a 240mm. Small hands does not make a difference the 240mm is a perfect size for prep work. It does not take long at all getting used to the size even if you have been using smaller knifes.

Gyuto is important, the knife you will use the most. Tojiro HSPS 240mm 128.00 Knives and Stones.

Both cleaver and gyuto are good deals at this time with a favorable exchange rate.

ps. if you don't have something to sharpen with you better budget at least a little money for a king 1000/6000 combo waterstone at minimum. Do not get a honing rod.

I would suggest looking at a carbo-next chefs knife ( from jck ) , this is the best knife I feel comfortable taking to work. It cuts and holds an edge well for the price and if it is damaged ,stolen etc I wouldn't loose any sleep. I take a tojiro bread knife, victorinox pallet knife , swibo butchers and boning knives and a couple of cheap pairing knives ( birds beak and straight ). I also have 1000/4000 combination splash and go stone from Koki ( JCK ) that works well for the quick touch ups that are sometimes needed at work.
This set of knives certainly won't break the bank and will function very well without making you paranoid about their security etc.
I own many high end knives just very rarely take them to work.

Good luck and happy shopping!

Doesn't sound like OP is looking for a work kit

Uh... How's that?

none of you addressed the fact that he is best suited to a knife with some belly on it.

What cutting motions do you primarily use?

Rocking

start with this

mac pro 200mm

richard said:

Doesn't sound like OP is looking for a work kit

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Oops didn't fully read all of the post

DravenX said:

Well being used to Global Knives, I owned a Santoku Knife years ago recently, I have seen them advertised as a Deba Knife so thats why I included Santoku/Deba togeather in the post, I'm going to be using the knife for mainly doing vegetables and fruits as well as your usual prep work. Eventually I would like to get a Fillet Knife for breaking down whole fish when I need to. Maybe there's a misunderstanding on my part for thinking that a Santoku knife and a Deba Knife are the same thing. I know I'm probably coming off as being misinformed and I do apologize about that. That's one of the reasons I joined the forum was to get guidance and learn

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This is how and what you use a deba for.

[video=youtube;W7__yMkGvzc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7__yMkGvzc[/video]

A santoku is just a short snub nose knife that doesn't really excel at anything other than maybe chopping. Although many knives can carry this task as well.

Thanks for clearing up the deba/santoku misunderstanding, and I appreciate all of the feedback thus far, I have been doing searching based upon recommendation