Best Gyutos Under-$200. What're your favorites?

[DitmasPork]

What're your fave gyutos under-$200 USD?

Lately I've been eyeing gyutos in the under-$200 strata of the market. Saw these yesterday when I popped into a NYC knife store. I like Takamura, good knife—won a 180 gyuto from a raffle.

 

[jaydee]

There was a thread regarding this price bracket already, no? Cannot find it right now.

Anyways, i would name a custom made by Zakharov (ukrainian knifemaker) and i really like knives in SK steel.
Easy to sharpen, they do get quite sharp, never managed to make any chips into mine and it was actually <50$ back then. (Kanetsune 180mm gyuto)
Havent tried them but lots of makers work with that steel. (Kanehide,masakane, fujiwara FKM,morihei,kogetsu...)

 

[Jovidah]

If you're okay with it being on the thin & delicate side it's really hard to beat the Takamura for out of the box cutting experience.
Robert Herder is also a contender for me for the same reason, though it's not going to be that cheap outside of Europe (if you can find it at all).

But admittedly that's just what I've used; I've never tried any of the cheaper Japanese offerings from Hokiyama that got more popular and widely available in recent years. For me though thickness / thinness behind the edge seems to be hte main shortcoming of most cheaper knives, and if a knife scores well on this front, regardless of how many other shortcomings it has, at least it'll cut well.

 

[blokey]

Masutani, Takamura, Kyohei Shindo, stuffs on KnifeJapan, Ikazuchi, Deep Impact, En, Hokiyama stuff too. For non-Japanese I'm trying to get something from Kitchen knife ID now.

 

[DitmasPork]

Missed the previous thread. Under-$200 is useful for recommendations to friends wanting to upgrade their cheap knives to ‘good knives.’

 

[Jovidah]

Yeah... there's these psychological barriers of 'acceptable budget'.... 100 bucks I already found a tough sell for a lot of people, 150 is pushing it, and 200 is pretty much the highest 99% of people will go.

 

[blokey]

Yeah... there's these psychological barriers of 'acceptable budget'.... 100 bucks I already found a tough sell for a lot of people, 150 is pushing it, and 200 is pretty much the highest 99% of people will go.

At that price range Masutani is pretty great, much better grind than most cheap Japanese knives, and very well made, go lower I'd say Tojiro A-1, thin blade with muh flat grind, but it's gonna impress most people who never had a good knife, they cost the same as most cheapo stuff so it wouldn't break the bank.

 

[daniel_il]

Cheap masahiro VC is pretty good, nice steel. With bit of thinning its very good.

Misono is bit nicer. For 200ish probably can get ashi hamono which is very high performance blade.

 

[DitmasPork]

Yeah... there's these psychological barriers of 'acceptable budget'.... 100 bucks I already found a tough sell for a lot of people, 150 is pushing it, and 200 is pretty much the highest 99% of people will go.

For home cooks, lotta my friends/family have under-$50, under-$20 knives—usable for them cooking good food. Many pro cooks I know use cheap knives at work. My grandma got by with a cheap Chinese cleaver and a wonky sharpening stone for doing great food.

 

[HumbleHomeCook]

Tsunehisa.

 

[blokey]

This just showed up on my timeline.
https://www.instagram.com/stories/the_homebutcher/3038809270414519945/

 

[HumbleHomeCook]

If these ever get restocked they are an awesome value!

https://homebutcher.com/collections...oducts/hatsukokoro-3-layer-blue-2-gyuto-210mm

 

[coxhaus]

You know me I would buy a Wusthof 10-inch chefs knife or a Henckels 10-inch chefs knife. No carbon steel for me in the kitchen.

 

[kpham12]

Masutanis are small, but great grind and F&F for the price.

Masahiro VC is good, 2 hours of thinning and it’s great. Excellent steel and you can beat it into the ground and sharpen it up again super easy. Cheaper than a lot of the other name brands with similar construction (yo handle, pretty thin spine, asymmetric chisel grind) like Masamoto, Kikuichi Carbon, etc. Sugimoto is known more for cleavers, but their stainless/carbon gyutos are really nice too. They have a big relief bevel that’s easy to thin and maintain. Sakai Takayuki Grand Chef in “Swedish steel” is a good tough beater too.

Munetoshi, some Masashi/Wakui. Katayama VG10 out of Echizen if you want something flashy with good F&F. You can find some of the OEM SRS-13/15 stuff under 200 if you want a good PM gyuto.

 

[tostadas]

Non-stainless
Kyohei Shindo, Matsubara White#1, Munetoshi

Stainless
Kaeru SS, Takamura, S Tanaka Ginsan

Shiro Kamo also has a lot of various options in this price range also, but I don't like them as much as the ones listed above.

 

[chefwp]

I recently recommended a Kanehide 210mm in TK semistainless to a friend, he got one and is quite happy with it.

 

[Jovidah]

You know me I would buy a Wusthof 10-inch chefs knife or a Henckels 10-inch chefs knife. No carbon steel for me in the kitchen.

Sorry, but even at 50% off I consider my Wüsthof chef's knife one of my worst purchases, and the worst value of all the knives I own. Pretty much everything else runs circles around it, even in a similar - or lower - price range. And plenty of them are stainless.
I do agree that if I was to recommend someone their 'one good knife', I would make it a stainless one.

 

[DitmasPork]

Sometimes I find it a challenge to convince people the value of of spending even over $100 on a good knife. There're home cooks I know, that a MISEN would be a major upgrade.

Two brands of knives I've been recommending for newbies are Mac and the JKI stainless series.

In Hawaii, family members find it difficult to ignore the allure of $5–$7 knife sets. I tired of cooking with their cheap knives, thus bringing my knife roll.

 

[tostadas]

Also, dinosaurs.

 

[MarcelNL]

my motto is 'better buy used quality products then new garbage' , so I'd vote for a higher end used Gyoto

 

[blokey]

Also, dinosaurs.

View attachment 225843

well 3512 definitely real people can't be wrong.

 

[GorillaGrunt]

Definitely Kaeru especially for pros, and Takamura. Anything from Knife Japan, and a lot of Tosa forged knives especially in blue and especially for butcher kind of stuf. Also the ultimate value for money compared to more expensive blades will always be the cleaver, actual cheap Chinese or SE Asian ones.

 

[coxhaus]

Sorry, but even at 50% off I consider my Wüsthof chef's knife one of my worst purchases, and the worst value of all the knives I own. Pretty much everything else runs circles around it, even in a similar - or lower - price range. And plenty of them are stainless.
I do agree that if I was to recommend someone their 'one good knife', I would make it a stainless one.

Maybe you didn't buy a Wusthof Classic? There are plenty of cheap stainless out there. I have owned some which I got rid of.

You might throw the MAC PRO in there. The small handle started me down the bad path and they don't seem to stand up to lots of limes for me anyway. I own one wish I would not have bought it.

 

[Jovidah]

Sometimes I find it a challenge to convince people the value of of spending even over $100 on a good knife. There're home cooks I know, that a MISEN would be a major upgrade.

Two brands of knives I've been recommending for newbies are Mac and the JKI stainless series.

In Hawaii, family members find it difficult to ignore the allure of $5–$7 knife sets. I tired of cooking with their cheap knives, thus bringing my knife roll.

I feel your pain. Everytime I'm at my parents place and have to cut bread I curse their cheapskating because they insisted on buying some utter piece of garbage for 15 bucks because they didn't want to spend 30 on a Victorinox. Generally people asking me for advice I can convince to spend up to a hundred bucks... but if people aren't looking for it anything above 20 is a stretch it seems.

my motto is 'better buy used quality products then new garbage' , so I'd vote for a higher end used Gyoto

I'm not entirely sure this applies to knives. If you're shopping in the lower price regions you'll find either junk, or stuff that's so overused that it needs significant restoration. Old stuff that has only gotten thicker behind the edge after repeated sharpenings is not necessarily a great deal unless you have the means and desire to take such a restoration project upon you.

 

[Jovidah]

Maybe you didn't buy a Wusthof Classic? There are plenty of cheap stainless out there. I have owned some which I got rid of.

Everything I own and used was always classic or classic Ikon series (they consider it a higher end range but it's pretty much classic without bolsters).
Current price for a 23 cm Wüsthof classic here is 149 euros, for a classic Ikon 159. IMO anything more than 50 euros is too much for them.

I hate the smaller knives less (actually quite like the utility knife, mostly because at least it has a decent sized handle while most Japanese stuff in this length does not), but they're still way too expensive for what they are.

 

[MowgFace]

One of my go tos for recommending to friends is the Suisin Inox series for western handles, and Gesshin Uraku for Wa.

The Suisin Inox, is JUST different enough to differentiate it from a regular black handle knife, and thin and durable for those non-initiated. On the cheap western side of things, Kanehide and Masahiro are some of my favorite series for non-stainless.

Gesshin Uraku is just a SOLID stainless gyuto. Had one of the old stock AUS 240s that i gifted to a buddy, and currently own a 210 of the current version in VG-1. The newer version is thinner overall and lives in my travel kit.

 

[M1k3]

Takamura, just wish the lower cost options came in 240mm+ options.

Tosa. Good steel. A bit heavy on the Wabi Sabi (rough edges and corners). But for how cheap they are, can't complain.

Munetoshi

Masahiro also. Some might need a little sandpaper massaging on the spine and choil. But nothing crazy.

 

[MowgFace]

Takamura, just wish the lower cost options came in 240mm+ options.

Tosa. Good steel. A bit heavy on the Wabi Sabi (rough edges and corners). But for how cheap they are, can't complain.

Munetoshi

Masahiro also. Some might need a little sandpaper massaging on the spine and choil. But nothing crazy.

And potentially the handle if you opt for the bolsterless version.

 

[DitmasPork]

I feel your pain. Everytime I'm at my parents place and have to cut bread I curse their cheapskating because they insisted on buying some utter piece of garbage for 15 bucks because they didn't want to spend 30 on a Victorinox. Generally people asking me for advice I can convince to spend up to a hundred bucks... but if people aren't looking for it anything above 20 is a stretch it seems.

IMHO, my mom's best knives are her ancient Mac knives. I believe they were purchased not long after the Mac Knife Corp launched. Still being used.

 

[MowgFace]

For whatever reason I have a irrational love for bolsterless yo handles

Also, all of my dad's Stones look exactly like that.