MAKER | Naoki Mazaki |
TYPE & LENGTH | Gyuto 210mm |
STEEL & BLADE | Shirogami #2 Iron Clad |
FINISH | Migaki |
WEIGHT / BALANCE | 157g / +20 |
HANDLE MATERIAL | Magnolia/Walnut |
| |
TOTAL LENGTH | 359 |
BLADE LENGTH | 225 |
EDGE LENGTH | 216 |
| |
HEIGHT AT HEEL | 50 |
HEIGHT AT MID BLADE | 38 |
HEIGHT 35mm TO TIP | 21 |
| |
SPINE THICKNESS | (5.3mm out of handle) |
HEEL | 4.8 |
MID BLADE | 2 |
35mm TO TIP | 1.5 |
10mm TO TIP | 0.5 |
| |
WIDE BEVEL EDGE THICKNESS | @ 19-25 (Shinogi) / 10 / 5 / 1mm |
Average | 1.7 / 1 / 0.5 / < 0.1 |
Handle: 0/1
Ok, balance works well indeed for me, but it can’t make up for anything with this handle – the worst Wa I ever encountered. It’s just cheap and God ugly. It actually put me off from buying this unit for a long time. And it’s worse than I thought in person because it really
feels crappy and is not fitted very well.
Handles are a bad way to start a review, and can most often be dispatched with as a side note anyhow... So the score stands for the sample at hand as much as the criterion in itself I guess.
Blade: 1/1
Here I can’t take much out of Mazaki’s work. The blade is acutely forged, cut and ground to shape, well rounded at the spine and chamfered smoothly enough at the choil, yet some leftover roughness combined with the finish pointedly reclaim its artisan makings. Well-deserved full marks, some minor improvements since the Winter 2020 batch as I experienced it – and they were quite good. Being so nice a blade, for sure, makes the handle even worse somehow to me.
Once upon a time I used a general F&F criterion regrouping such observations with others – like about the handle for example. It was probably better.
Finish: 1/1
What first and foremost draws attention is the almost crude “home sharpened and DIY finish” looks. It’s quite deliberate and one could read a lot into it – see
Personal Notes. Yet this unit is quite well groomed when considering the finer details. Kudos to Mazaki for devising a progression to achieve such results in a few minutes, for it wouldn’t make sense for the price otherwise.
A surprising feat is very little food discoloration for such a usually highly reactive construction, which in my head from other experiences tends to resonate with “freak show” particularly where any W#2 iron clad is concerned. Also, lately it’s been horribly humid and stagnant around here, and I have no air conditioning nor much means to even move air around, still I’ve found very little perturbation with this one contrarily to my Ittetsu (iron clad W#1) which dirty patina took a turn towards almost rust in a few days while it was stored. The final high polish to almost mirror Mazaki gives these has good effect.
Reading reports from other members, YMMV…
Obviously, this criterion was once at the heart of the larger F&F criterion. I remember it was buying into higher end knives that had me compartment it into specifics, as I felt they demanded more critical focus and less personal bias there. But the former approach was much more flexible and enjoyable to write.
Grind: 1.5/2
The new profile…
I like it. It has more of a flat spot than most 210mm, but not exaggeratedly so as I felt with a Yoshikane unit of the same length, which honestly felt “dead” to me. It also has much more decent height and knuckles clearance. I think it’s possibly my favorite OOTB
edge profile of all so far, if not my favorite overall profile. Admittedly the tip took some adjustment to work with at first: I’m used to compensate for higher tips. Less compensation becomes more natural though, as it should… given a little more time with it.
As to how that tip affects performance, I’d say it lands so and so. In some cuts like tip chopping mushrooms I get some elevated kicks with it, but in general use I don’t see any finer point to it – pun intended. It’s not inferior but it’s somewhat weird for eye-to-produce metrics. I don’t know how to explain it otherwise. Once accustomed to it, and once tested enough that I knew it wasn’t any kind of fragile – which is a feat, narrow and thin as it is – I have nothing to say against it in my use. But it just doesn’t enhance much of anything for what it presents of… aaah
cognitive dissonance in early use? And then I guess you take to it like I obviously did, or you don’t – but like,
not at all. Otherwise, it might also prove rather limiting with some cutting motions.
Grind is neat and does seem to follow a specific idea pretty similar to the “Winter 2020” grind in form, just noticeably leaner. Performance confirms this thinner geometry of Mazaki almost feels like anything-but-Mazaki. Or since it’s rather hard to pinpoint what a Mazaki is supposed to feel like in the end over a significant enough timeline, one way to put it is it feels anything-but-Sanjo. You sure have that generously thick spine… that insane spinal taper… there’s even still a quite forward balance. But in cutting, it feels like a 3mm thick midweight.
However, looking at it for what it is intrinsically, viewing it out-of-the-Sanjo-box that is, the latest Maz works very well. The thicker heel region feels righteously solid and hefty, yet food separation is rather laser-ish onward, with the Shinogi transition almost imperceptible, but with just that nice amount of tangible feedback and strength into the cut. I wouldn’t buy one immediately thinking of a workhorse use – if only for the tip limiting any rocking technique – like I guess you could buy the older Mazakis for, but it definitely isn’t delicate neither and is quite a splendid midweight in that powerful nimbleness it has. The last 15-20mm to tip or so is noticeably thinner, where my measurements dropped by 0.2mm at 5mm and 10mm BTE. Long before there, the Shinogi is slowly getting erased with the grind.
Half a point was still removed because something important (to me) is indeed lost in translation from older Mazakis: food release is not this knife’s strongest suit. I would barely call it average, almost call it poor. I don’t think it’s related with the finish, as there isn’t real stickiness to speak of; rather it behaves like a geometry thing. It hasn’t been overly bothering in real world use, but a natural fall off is not to be expected much at any rate. Choil would have suggested better release to my eyes, so there’s a good deal of grinding going on forward. Perhaps a bit too much for its own good and that’s the worst thing I can say about an otherwise superb performance and rather unique experience.
It also sharpens very well, as easy and keen as I expect out of White #2 and possibly the best edge retention I’ve seen to date with it. Which wouldn’t mean much of anything, it’s impossible to reciprocate circumstances of use, and sharpening skills were sort of idling back when I had a nice W#2 at hand (Y. Tanaka) as I had just started dedicating myself to switching hands. But I’m still quite impressed with the Maz all things weighed in.
This criterion is okay. A few food prep pics would suit it well. Always tried to limit myself to a single post and 10 pics limit, but I guess we could all make do without the two grind shots – and sometimes useless handle pictures – I usually provide in favor of livelier pics.
Overall Score: 3.5/4 …
(…just being consistent with the uselessness of a dedicated handle criterion; 3.5/5 if we must…)
