My favorite color is USED .......the unvarnished patina thread!

Kitchen Knife Forums

Help Support Kitchen Knife Forums:

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

Carl Kotte

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2019
Messages
3,466
Reaction score
6,510
Location
Stockholm, Sweden
Photos by @stringer and comments by @panda made me crave for a thread for photos of knives in action - heavily used carbon blades with patina (not necessarily blue and pretty but more .... like Pizza?! spotty, orange, red, black and whatever), scratches and wear. Show me your blades, unvarnished, gross and ugly!
 
Last edited:
Here’s a couple recently snapped.

Gesshin Hide Honyaki gyuto and Konosuke FT gyuto.

And though the patina is light, I suppose the third image needs no explanation.

Use ‘em all!!
 

Attachments

  • F985F327-EBDF-4C6C-A742-12D4EEE92EA8.jpeg
    F985F327-EBDF-4C6C-A742-12D4EEE92EA8.jpeg
    30.3 KB · Views: 714
  • 194AFE18-0C7C-4D9F-A9B7-2E5852CC15A4.jpeg
    194AFE18-0C7C-4D9F-A9B7-2E5852CC15A4.jpeg
    21.7 KB · Views: 822
  • 6F305D5A-ED1A-4959-B449-C27DCC2603E4.jpeg
    6F305D5A-ED1A-4959-B449-C27DCC2603E4.jpeg
    43.7 KB · Views: 828
I was surprised how hard these particular ones are. They don't feel soft like stainless Sabatier lions or German carbon that I own. They definitely aren't as hard as my factory Japanese blades so maybe 57ish. It's also unclear what kind of heat treat these things got. I'm not sure how drop forging works. Or pre 1950 heat treatments and tempering strategies. These things come very raw. The guy who sells them doesn't have a lot of info. They are on eBay if you search for Sabatier blank.
 
This is slightly off-topic, but I allow myself this one.
I did part of my training at a busy place with foie gras on the menu. How do you make your newly acquired Wüsthof Dreizack slice through food in the same way as glowing metal cuts through butter? Easy: just place your knife on the stove until it changes color. Then cut! Foie gras e.g. Despite thinning and lots of use, one can still see some dark areas left on the blade.
IMG_2470.jpg
IMG_2471.jpg

No need for a dedicated foie gras cutter [emoji12]
 
This is slightly off-topic, but I allow myself this one.
I did part of my training at a busy place with foie gras on the menu. How do you make your newly acquired Wüsthof Dreizack slice through food in the same way as glowing metal cuts through butter? Easy: just place your knife on the stove until it changes color. Then cut! Foie gras e.g. Despite thinning and lots of use, one can still see some dark areas left on the blade. View attachment 58174View attachment 58175
No need for a dedicated foie gras cutter [emoji12]

Hah, genius.

So, did it kill the heat treat? Maybe it doesn’t even matter if you’re only cutting foie though?
 
Hah, genius.

So, did it kill the heat treat? Maybe it doesn’t even matter if you’re only cutting foie though?

Yeah, I suppose! The knife hasn’t been quite the same since. But it still works ok and can take a decent edge.
It went through this inverted spa treatment for a month (we were both happy the menu changed): several times every evening it got the re-heattreatment only to be quenched in liver paté. Life
 
Last edited:
Back
Top