juice
Doesn't even buy knives
Yes, I am a komplete knife knumpty, as most of you are well aware.
My knife of choice for the past six years or so has been a Shun 200mm Elite Gyuto SG2-clad VG10 (I presume) so it's not a terrible knife, but not flash, either. I struggled to afford it when I bought it (on a decent special, and it was the best knife I could afford at the time), and so haven't been able to replace it with anything better since. (Did you know the job market is screwed for journalists/photographers/people with ADHD and depression and various anxieties and neck injuries and chronic headaches? Well, hard as it is to believe, now you know
Anyway, now we've set the historical scene, let us move on. A couple of weeks ago, a very generous member of the forum here in Australia (@benhendy) sent me a DM and asked if I'd like to borrow his correct-handed @Kippington . Yep, really. I was somewhat overwhelmed by the offer, and kinda terrified of accepting (I tend to catastrophise everything, and the offer of a knife of this calibre makes that super easy to do), but Ben talked me off the ledge and sent it down here. Arrived yesterday, despite our COVID-related delays in the post.
You can see it HERE
It's quite a bit bigger and heavier than the Shun that has been my main knife for six years (41cm v 33cm, 289g v 209g, 57mm v 45mm heel height, both balance at the heel), and when I first got it out of the box I was pretty intimidated by it, TBH.
It's gorgeous. I love the handle with the dual spacers and the dark teatree wood, and the mirror finish and the grind are sophistication personified. Its beauty is in its lack of ornamentation - it's not pretty (looking at you, Damascus), rather it's beautiful. It's Sophia Loren/Audrey Hepburn, where the beauty lasts well into the senior years as opposed to the latest pretty Hollywood bimbo who will be off the scene before they're 40 despite all the plastic surgery. It's just classy (possibly unlike my previous analogy).
I did some prep for my wife this morning which was mostly dicing up some onions for some savoury mince for us to put in the freezer. I'm getting better at onions, but I'm still not great (with anything, really, I can't concentrate hard/long enough to learn properly, bloody ADHD), so I figured this beast of a knife was going to be pretty hard to use, but I couldn't have been more wrong.
Despite the increased size, I was immediately more accurate with it in all the cuts, and my wife, who had said she wanted a "fine dice" immediately directed that the second onion be cut into far larger pieces. It really was that easy - from the first onion, I was already cutting better when I had completely expected to make a mess of it. But despite the extra size and weight it was just easier to use than the Shun, and MUCH easier to use a pinch grip with, which obviously helps with the size. I still think I will be better off in the long run with a smaller knife, but I'm far less convinced of that now than I was 12 hours ago after using this one for a bit.
OK, I'd better post this now or I won't get it out tonight, but I'll be using for more stuff in the coming days and I'll report on how it works for a knumpty in those situations as well.
TL;DR - even a relatively unskilled knife user is immediately improved when using a super-knife like this.
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(can't see a like button, presumably I have limited privileges in this forum)
