Is it Worth Buying a Henckels 4 Star, 7 Inch Chef's Knife for $40

Advertise with us
Miura knives
Find deals on amazon
Kitchen Knife Forums

Help Support Kitchen Knife Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
N

Nife

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 31, 2016
Messages
49
Reaction score
2
I am a wobbler and I want a decent nife that is easy to sharpen, not too expensive, that I can beat up when I practice sharpening. The Henckels 4 Star, 7 inch Chef's nife is currently on sale for $40. I might be able to get one for $32 total including shipping. Is the famous Henckels 4 Star Chef's nife worth $40. I could use it to cut up raw chicken, although I would only do that once in a while, maybe 3 times a year.

My objective is to sharpening it frequently for practice, and basically use it as a beater nife. Mora nives are very good for the price, but I don't want to practice sharpening on a Scandi grind.
 
Not sure about that Henckels being made in China...
Anyway, I once bought a Wüsthof Cordon Bleu for some €30 for work on crappy poly boards in a welfare kitchen. Did a good job, and could be used by some co-workers. But no soft stainless for easy sharpening. Krupp's 1.4116 isn't easy at all. Alterwisser is right: have a basic carbon steel blade instead. A K-Sabatier will cost you €50.
 
But to the OP, if you're a wobbler as in your own words, cut a few corks or pieces of wood that correspond to a few commonly used angles. Just for reference. 4, 8, 10 12, 15, 18 degree. Before and after any stroke you put the blade on it to see what slope you're looking for. And use a marker to see where you're actually abrading. Looking for the scratch pattern may be helpful if you have a loop. With carbons, the lost patina on blank parts helps as well.
 
According to online information, the A.J. Henckel 4 star knives are still made in Germany. I checked with Williams Sonoma and they claim that the Henckels 4 star, 7 inch chef's knife is made in Germany. It generally retails for around $80.

I don't want to spend good money for a carbon knife that I will dislike and not use, such as the Tojiro ITK Gyutou which goes for approximately $60. Would an Old Hickory butcher knife, which is high carbon, be a reasonable knife on which to practice sharpening? Since they are less than $20, I don't care if I hate the knife for use if it gives me productive sharpening practice. approximately $60.
 
alterwisser said:
I think you're better off buying a cheap Carbon knife to practice sharpening, instead of a soft steel German (China made) knife ...
Click to expand...


:plus1:


Make the cheap carbon a Japanese knife. They're hard enough to form an edge & de-burr cleanly. Nothing sucks like trying to figure out sharpening on a soft ass knife....complete waste of time & money. It's super frustrating to find that the burr is the edge & vice versa with those knives.
 
Is there a particular reason you dislike the Tojiro ITK?

I bought an eBay special from Japan, Gekko branded 165mm bunka, made from blue #2 steel for about $65. Crummy edge out of the box. Practiced sharpening it, and it cuts great now. I keep it on my magnetic rack and actually reach for it fairly often even though I have nicer knives that I like a lot more.
 
I recently got the 4 Star three piece set for pretty cheap and it says it's made in Germany. I got it to have a softer more forgiving steel for rough work, IMO it'll be a PITA to sharpen with the full bolster when the time comes.
 
When I first tried to sharpen, I got to try a Tojiro ITK gyuto. My sharpening ability was slightly worse then than it is now. It was fun to sharpen and easily raised a burr on my 1K SG stone. It sliced paper, but at best only borderline shave. The knife would rust before my eyes as I was sharpening. When the knife was loaned to me it was very sharp. I did not enjoy using it to cut vegetables, and I think the taste of my food was adversely effected by the knife.

I might still purchase an Old Hickory because it is so inexpensive. I would prefer to use the $60 or so cost of the ITK toward purchasing a better knife, but only if I improve at sharpening. I would enjoy sharpening the knife, but I would not use the knife. I have a lot of expenses over the next several months, so funds are tight. I am willing to spend up to $30 for a knife I don't like, but I would rather not spend $60. Unfortunately many proficient sharpeners advise using decent high carbon Japanese knives to facilitate improvement in freehand sharpening, but they are somewhat expensive for use as beater knives.

I didn't think of the burr issue with soft carbon steel, that Dave mentioned. I was thinking of getting an Old Hickory, and I still might since it is so cheap, but decent Japanese steel would be much easier and better to work with. I won't get the Henckels.
 
Dave Martell said:
:plus1:


Make the cheap carbon a Japanese knife. They're hard enough to form an edge & de-burr cleanly. Nothing sucks like trying to figure out sharpening on a soft ass knife....complete waste of time & money. It's super frustrating to find that the burr is the edge & vice versa with those knives.
Click to expand...

Don't really understand, Dave. Soft carbon Sabs take easily a crazy sharp edge, won't hold it for very long, but get restored with a few strokes.
I've seen what you describe only with old blades that had been steeled forever, and where the fatigued steel has first to be removed.
 
natto: do you know of any other sellers of the Tosa Bunka knives?

Hidatool sells a 6.5 inch one for $33.90. The knife only weighs 0.3 pounds and is shipped from Berkley California. I live in Las Vegas. I called Hidatool to get the cost of shipping, and I was ready to buy. They informed me that the shipping charge would be $12. That is outrageous. I have bought heavier knives from the East Coast and had them shipped for much less. All the google sources for the Tosa Bunka knives that I found lead to Hidatool. I am guessing that Hidatool low balls their prices and inflates shipping charges, as some Amazon Market Place sellers do.
 
Ebay hanmomon-japan has Tosa knives $37+free shipping
 
Thought we were talking knives here, who brought up Tosa?

One day, one knife - it would rather rust than cut.
 
Nife said:
natto: do you know of any other sellers of the Tosa Bunka knives?

Hidatool sells a 6.5 inch one for $33.90. The knife only weighs 0.3 pounds and is shipped from Berkley California. I live in Las Vegas. I called Hidatool to get the cost of shipping, and I was ready to buy. They informed me that the shipping charge would be $12. That is outrageous. I have bought heavier knives from the East Coast and had them shipped for much less. All the google sources for the Tosa Bunka knives that I found lead to Hidatool. I am guessing that Hidatool low balls their prices and inflates shipping charges, as some Amazon Market Place sellers do.
Click to expand...

Wow you need to chill out. I just shipped a hard drive to LA and it cost about the same.
Most online only businesses absorb the cost of shipping to incentivize buyers. Hida tool is a brick and mortar with larger overheads. Plus their shipping is clearly outlined on the page.
 
Natto, could you please post a link. Also, I don't know any Japanese, so I hope I could use the site. I am willing to risk $40, and I am not expecting to get a great knife, just a reasonable high carbon knife to practice on.
 
Hello Nife, in Germany you can buy standard Tosas at http://tosa-hocho.de/standardmesser.

To be clear, I never owned one. Some people say Tosas are not worth the money, others like them. It's because these are project knives. It is not only about fit and finish, the grind varies also. To make a nice knife of it you might like to thin it to the point you like, clean up the surface and mount a nice handle. Further you need a vendor where it is easy to return the knife, in the case you get a bad one.

But the steel and heat treat should be good, easy to learn sharpening. I always liked to have one because of it's purity, to see what I can get out of it.

Sorry, but I can't suggest other vendors. Google isn't really helpful and I haven't collected Tosa links. Members with Tosas from your country might help.
 
Already confused whether we are talking about exactly these knives (and the Zakuri brand that seems related) or all knives made in the Tosa region in that price range and style.... which would include eg the "Tosa kajiyamura" labelled knives dictum sells (under the "Kuro Ochi" brand)...

@daveb why do you apparently dislike value-for-money user knives, especially when comparing them to something mass made (which would have to stand a comparison with the hard drive somebody mentioned, let's look at a $40 hard drive, which is a manufactured good several million times more complex than a knife!).


...

If you want to practice sharpening stainless steel, maybe go for steel-handled IKEAs, which are ... kind of inspired by another major (and popular in pro circles) maker's line ;) They are usually recognized as being OK steel (likely, not a *fundamentally* different steel from what an average euro chef knife uses!) and grind but inconsistently sharpened OOTB (I got one that came razor sharp OOTB but with kinda odd angles, others report getting blunt ones...) - so good value if you want to take responsibility for the edge yourself.
 
I hope your perception that I dislike "money for value" knives is not widely shared - few things could be further from the truth.

I do feel that buying on price is not the same as buying on value. I see no value in buying a Tosa brand knife, at any price, when my experience is that the knife will rust between the sink and the rack. I also see no value, at any price, for a newcomer to have to take "responsibility" for thinning, establishing an edge or sharpening. If my first Jknife had been such a "value", there would likely not have been a second.

There are a few value knives that I will recommend, have bought and currently own. Personal favorites in this category include Gesshin Stainless and Suisin Western Inox. I own and use examples of both. Torijo DP is a not so distant third.

I would not ever recommend carbon to someone new to the knife world. But that's my opinion. You are of course free to have your own opinion and are encouraged to express it here. I will not call into question your opinion as that would be tacky.

Hugs.
 
Thanks for the information Daveb.

I am okay with carbon blades that are mildly to moderately reactive, and I love my Spyderco Gayle Bradley 2 with M4 steel that I use as a steak knife. It sounds like the Tosa may be almost as reactive as the Tojiro ITK. In that case I would not want to use the knife for cutting food. However, I may still purchase a low cost carbon blade that I will abuse to practice sharpening, and thinning.

My somewhat compulsive research indicates that the Zakuri 165mm Blue #1 Kurouchi Tosagata Bocho (Santoku) for $70.00 sold by JKI is my pick for the best moderately priced high carbon knife to buy, for learning to sharpen.

I probably won't get this knife since I plan on jointing the knife, then sharpening it on a 1K stone almost every day, and also practicing thinning. If I bought that knife, I would probably find it too good to use as a beater knife. Hopefully if I purchase a high quality JKI knife in the future, I will take good care of it and not needlessly abrade a lot of metal. I have beater stainless knives to practice on and I may still purchase a not too expensive high carbon knife to practice. I think my limited ability (fine motor coordination) and limited experience is much more of a problem than the knives that I sharpen. However, Dave M. is correct that removing the burr is very challenging on softer steel, and can make the learning process more difficult. I have a couple of decent knives that I do not sharpen freehand.

Thanks everyone for your feedback.
 
Let me just wade in briefly... I have a Zakuri 165mm Aogami #1 Tosagata Bocho which I just finished thinning and refinishing, and I can confirm your suspicions, that this is far too much of a little gem to abuse. It's still a project knife, but it's a project knife that turns into something really lovely with a bit of work, so maybe a better one to look at for down the road.

There is much talk of perfecting your freehand skills on good carbon steels, as it makes it easier and less frustrating to get a good edge. However, I did not - nor I wager did many others on this forum - learn to sharpen this way. I learned on soft, cheap, American and Euro stainless for the most part, using Arkansas stones; the best steels I really ever had available then were some Stanley 1095-mod (Chrome-vanadium) chisels and plane irons. It was slow and frustrating, and good edges did not come easily, but the experience taught me a lot about sharpening. After I began purchasing knives and tools with nicer steels, and upgrading my stones, sharpening became much easier and more enjoyable (It felt like a reward after what I had gone through to get there!), but I don't know if I would have learned what I did if I had started out with the high quality steels and the fast, forgiving stones. Sometimes it is a good thing that you are not immediately gratified, as this pushes you to learn more, and not grow confident in your results when you are still inexperienced.

If you want a cheap knife that has better than average steel and can use some time spent sharpening and thinning (Also, since you're already a Spyderco fan.), get yourself one of the plastic handled, Spyderco MBS-26 kitchen knives. These are typically $30-50 depending upon the model, and really aren't bad. At the same time, they aren't so nice that you'll feel bad beatin' on 'em, and you can be confident that you aren't destroying something unique like a hand-forged J-Knife. The grinds get thick quick, but MBS-26 is a really surprisingly nice stainless to sharpen, can take a really good edge, and doesn't have the burr problems of some of the cheaper SS's. Is it Hitachi carbon? No, but that's your reward at the end of the tunnel. Compared to a lot of the cheap SS on the market, something like MBS-26 is still really pretty darn cushy to practice with... ;)

Hopefully this helps...

- Steampunk
 
Intentionally sharpening it on 1K every day will rasp it down quick :) If you intend such practice, really go with, for example, something sold as seconds for cosmetic damage.
 
Sounds like Zakuri is an exception, but there really is reason to beware of some of these cheaper soft iron clad carbon knives. Not even just talking about the cladding rusting during food prep...but during sharpening as well (hitting the wide bevels). That can be annoying
 
If the plan is just to sharpen everyday, why not buy a cheap lot of junky ebay vintage carbon knives and repeat as necessary? Get them shaving sharp, cut some carrots, dull on wood, repeat.
 
Are you guys serious about vintage Sabs?? Most are in terrible shape -- overly steeled, reverse belly, protruding heel, overgrinds, expect real nightmares for a novice sharpener. And the prices have risen far beyond what's reasonable. That's why I suggested a new carbon Sab.
 
I just ordered a Spyderco MBS-26 6 inch utility kitchen knife.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top