Inexpensive knife for specific meat cutting - sausage making

[JWK1]

Actually, there's no sense in cluttering up the board with another thread.

And so...Part 2.

I have cut up four different pieces of pork butt for sausage since Bensuser posted above on Jan. 2nd. I actually dug out a CCK cleaver (the small slicer everyone buys - sorry, don't remember the number. 130x or something) I bought last year and an old Dexter cleaver I bought around the same time; both on the bay. That one link dafox gave got me to thinking, so I got out my King 1000/6000 stone and sharpened them up as best I could. I really need to learn how to sharpen better, but they are now the sharpest knives I have.

All four pieces weighed between 2 lbs. and 3.5 lbs. Each done on different days and each resulted in a different sausage. The results were stunningly outstanding. My son and daughter were staying with us for the holidays and we were all agreed that it was the best sausage I've ever made. I will never go back to a grinder for smaller amounts like this. The largest piece took between 15 and 20 minutes. I have a large #32 manual grinder that I use for large amounts, like when I buy 2 bone-in pork butts and make up a large amount for the freezer. To clean this grinder takes at least this long to clean, dry and put away.

I have better defined my needs from this experience. I definitely need a longer blade than 210mm. For obvious reasons, I do not need a knife with distal taper. More belly on the knife than I prefer for a general purpose gyuto (I always did lean toward a french profile) would be fine, but not too much more. The blade must be as as sharp as possible, so I simply must learn to use a stone effectively. I had been using an Edge Pro until last year, but I found out how bad I was at using a stone, so I would go back and forth a bit. That is done. Stones from now on.

Here are the choices I see right now that make sense to me:
1. Sharpen up my Carbonext 270 gyuto that's been sitting in a drawer for a few years or more.
2. Sharpen up my Carbonext 300 suji that's been sitting in a drawer for the same amount of time.
3. Buy a new knife. This will be carbon, probably Fujiwara FKH or Masahiro VC. If not carbon, then a cheap Victorinox.

This will be a single purpose tool. If it ends up serving other purposes, that's great, but it is not a criteria for making this choice. I am not looking to buy a new knife, I am not trying to avoid buying a new knife. I am hoping there are those that can answer some questions I have regarding the blades in question as they apply to this specific purpose.

How important is edge retention when cutting through this type of raw meat? I am using a Sani-tuff board for this and my blade very rarely touches the board, and when it does, it is lightly. How would the blades mentioned compare to each other for this purpose? Would I be able to put a more acute angle on a Victorinox than usual since I'm only slicing soft protein? Are they difficult to sharpen? What about the Carbonext? Easier than the usual SS blades to sharpen, or about the same? Will a high carbon blade like the Masahiro or Fujiwara would be far easier to sharpen, and will they stay sharp far longer. If the difference is marginal, I would probably lean toward the 270 Carbonext gyuto for now and learn how to sharpen, and then upgrade at a later date.

Thanks again for the help so far.

 

[Benuser]

The Victorinox soft stainless is quite abrasion resistant. I've often sharpened them out of the box and you better use a really coarse stone. They come with a very conservative V-shaped edge of some 22° per side, with pronounced shoulders. What I normally did was turning it into a convex edge after removing the shoulders and slightly reducing the angle of the very edge. The kind of job you use a 320 stone for. Further sharpening is simple: no refinement, please. End with a 800 or so and deburr with the green abrasive side of a common household ScotchBrite.
Both the Fujiwara FKH and the Masahiro VC come with a workable edge. Nothing spectacular. At this price level it's perfectly common to find an incomplete deburring. With a few strokes that's easily solved. Both sharpen very easily, the FKH even slightly easier. The VC alloy is more charged. It might be a novice will experience some difficulty in deburring.
Have sharpened a few times a Carbonext, but that's a long time ago. Only remembered I found them a bit thick behind the edge. Not that essential when used with fresh meat.
I don’t know how much you would pay the VC. Normally, I would say the FKH is hard to beat when value is considered. With FKH all models have about the same, very moderate price, even a 270mm gyuto.

 

[Jovidah]

If you already have the carbonext knives just go with that. Anything you buy on a budget isn't going to perform drastically different. You'd just be side grading.
If you tried it and it doesn't work for you you can always look further.

 

[DavidPF]

My vote is to get both of your two existing "candidate" knives nice and sharp, and when next sausage time comes, try them side by side. As long as you have something that's sharp and feels convenient enough to use, I think you're very unlikely to go wrong.

... and if you have the dedication and energy to cut up your sausage meat by hand to get the very best results, "more power to you" as they say.

 

[adam92]

+1 for FKH.

 

[DavidPF]

The VC alloy is more charged.

Are you talking about chemistry & molecular bonds there, or something else? Sorry if it's a dumb question.

 

[Benuser]

More elements added.