ITK Kiritsuke | A few words and pics

[Lefty]

Good little review. I learned a lot about grinding/reprofiling on a couple craptastic knives, as well. Now you'll be looking 15"x3"x3/32" pieces of HTd steel.

I bet the sword tip is used for back-alley fighting, à la "Gangs of New York".

[jayhay]

Here is a new shot of the knife after more work last night. Kurouchi is totally gone, and a fresh sharpen. Polished up a bit too. Hope you all like

Nice work, Jay.

Thanks for the review.

Edit: Off topic, but where (or to whom) do you sell your pasta? I would like to learn to make my own someday.

Just moved to Philly from Detroit and I'm working at a restaurant downtown. Smallish Mediterranean/rustic Italian joint. Pasta is really quite easy. There are two main types, sheeted and extruded. Extruded is all the box stuff most are familiar with, which is hard to make at home. Usually low-quality stuff, but quite different when freshly extruded and not dried and boxed for years of storage. However, you can find good quality artisan extruded-dried pasta at nicer grocery stores. The sheeted stuff is as simple as flour, semolina, eggs and water. Just need to have one of those hand-crank pasta machines like grandma had (or someones grandma had, mine didn't). Once sheeted its easy to make ravs, agnolotti, tortellini or whatever you desire. You can also simply cut the dough for fresh pasta like linguine, pappardelle or angel hair. Mark Vetri has a fool proof recipe for the sheeted variety, I found it online here,

http://www.sistersrunningthekitchen....c-pasta-dough/

And you can find those pasta machines at garage sales all the time on the cheap. Easy peasy.

Good little review. I learned a lot about grinding/reprofiling on a couple craptastic knives, as well. Now you'll be looking 15"x3"x3/32" pieces of HTd steel.

I bet the sword tip is used for back-alley fighting, à la "Gangs of New York".

Thanks Lefty! I'd love to learn to do more with knives, basic fab, learning how to rehandle, anything really. Unfortunately, my move has left me garageless and I have no room for equipment. Hopefully one day though.

And the knife makes me feel safer when I'm on the streets of Philly. I go to work with it in a small backpack and the knife is so long the handle sticks out the top. It's Learnado Ninja Turtles easy to whip out haha.

[Justin0505]

Great review and you clearly had a accurate expectations and understanding of this knife. I really like this line as well: I've had a few of the nakiri's and the 210 petty/gyuto. None of mine had holes in the edge, but the grinds where all pretty crude. If you have more knife-refurb time than money, or just want a practice project, these knives are a good way to end up with an outstanding final result after a little cash and a little more time.

I've given away all of my finished Tojiro ITK's and I don't currently have a project knife. Plus, I've never owned a kiritsuke... might need to pick one of these up...

[Mike9]

I have had the opposite experience with my 240 Gyuto. I don't mine the handle as the only difference between Tojiro and Tanaka is plastic vs horn ferrule. The blade on mine was spot on, the spine was nicely eased and after a good scrub the kurouchi finish is smooth. My only complaint is the sharp choil. I just hope the 210 Gyuto I ordered for a friend is as nice as my 240.

[Cutty Sharp]

And I put an edge on the front spine of the knife. You know, the transition spine that connects the top spine to the edge.

Just wondering, why'd you do this? For fun/interest, or will you use that edge somehow? (I mean, apart from swordfights with badguys )

[jayhay]

For fun. I wanted a knife I could work on, and fool around with. I've seen that portion sharpened on other similar style j-knives, so I thought what the heck, and I added the sword-style tip. I like it. It looks great, adds more thinness and it flies through onions. I could also probably use it pretty effectively in a sword fight lol.

[GlassEye]

Did you put an actual sharpened cutting edge on the tip or just beveled but not sharp like a true kiritsuke?

[jayhay]

Once I beveled it, I decided to put an actual cutting edge on it. Just seemed the right thing to do after all the work.

[Jmadams13]

What was your process for removing the kurouchi finish if you don't mind me asking? I'm thinking of removing it from my Tojiro, was very very rough out of the box

[jm2hill]

What was your process for removing the kurouchi finish if you don't mind me asking? I'm thinking of removing it from my Tojiro, was very very rough out of the box

just grab a couple of sheets of wet-dry sandpaper from your local shop and rub it away. Takes some manual labour but makes the knife feel way better.