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Tristam Douglas

Tristam Douglas

Active Member
Joined
Jun 8, 2019
Messages
27
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Location
England
Been lurking for a while. I thought it would be fun to join in. I have been cooking from the age of 8 and although I have worked in professional kitchens I am merely an enthusiastic home cook these days due to family circumstance.
 
Nemo said:
Welcome Tristam,

What sort of knives are you using at the moment? Do you have your eye on any others?
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Nothing too super exciting. My two current go to knives are my Masakage Koshi Bunka and 210mm TF Denka Gyuto,

Got a few Kai Shun and Global that I have had for about 25 years. Some very ordinary Saki Takayuki mukimono and Usuba.

Still got my 8” mid 70’s Gustav Emil 210mm chef, sadly is is not carbon.

Hand forged is a new thing for me so I may concentrate on sorting out my single bevels first.

I started my collection Japanese sword in 1984, pretty weird for an 8 year old. (Sold the collection when I moved to Dublin in 2000.)

I have a hankering for some honyaki steel. I have slobbered over some kirisuki for years. Top of the not the most sensible purchase list!
 
I'd say a TF Denka is pretty exciting. I know there's a lot of ridiculous eye candy floating around here, and I know TF can have its issues, but classics are classics for a reason.
Have fun diving into the deep end!
 
captaincaed said:
I'd say a TF Denka is pretty exciting.
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Ok you got me there! I had to buy the denka online. It took a number of returns/exchanges to get the one that was right for me.

That was a month from hell, just like December 1st to Xmas when you are 8 and every day is Xmas eve. I lay in wait for the DPD driver every 3rd day.
 
Tristam Douglas said:
Ok you got me there! I had to buy the denka online. It took a number of returns/exchanges to get the one that was right for me.

That was a month from hell, just like December 1st to Xmas when you are 8 and every day is Xmas eve. I lay in wait for the DPD driver every 3rd day.
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Yeah, I drove from the states to Canada just so I could put my hands on one before shelling out. Not sure I would have bought without that option. But man it was a long weekend.
 
There is not a vast selection of this quality of knife in the UK. I have had a couple of knives from Hocho Knife and with the import duty, tax on shipping and handling fee you are looking at adding 25-30% on to the price of whatever you are buying. I care full time for mother following her stroke in 2016 so having a trip down to London or whatnot is an impossibility.

The Denka was a real treat for me, there were only a handful of example available in the UK at the time and I wanted to get myself the best one while I could. Because of BREXIT the smaller companies who do sell the hand forged knives are struggling. When the GBP took a nose dive all their EU customers took advantage and pretty much cleaned them out they are struggling to restock and the prices will be going up and up.
 
Welcome to the forums there are a few UK users here, so it's not all sad and lonely.

For EU sales if you haven't seen them already Cleancut I'd say is the current best supplier of high quality "standard l" knives, Japanese Natural Stones in Denmark have a great rep (if a bit pricey for me) and then a few others. There are also a lot of European makers who would probably fit your bill in terms of quality and the deep end of the spectrum.

What was the issue with the Fujiwaras? I thought they were top of the food chain kind of knives.
 
DisconnectedAG said:
What was the issue with the Fujiwaras? I thought they were top of the food chain kind of knives.
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Variation in fit and finish and grind. My example has particularly fine tip for example.

The tweaked version of AS and the heat treatment are remarkable though, you can always tweak geometry etc.
 
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