Wielding a sharp edge

Wielding a sharp edge

Chef knives are the backbone to your kitchen

In most commercial kitchens you are using your knife all day. For this reason they need to be comfortable to hold, maintain their sharpness of edge well so that they can easily glide through food you want to cut. Tip: using a suitable chopping board helps maintain your knife's edge too as it reduces how fast it can blunt. It's important to keep your professional knife in the right knife storage, magnetic wall racks offer easy access, as well as blocks and wallets and cases for safe and easy manoeuvring. When using a knife block remember to store your knives upside down. This way when you select the knife for use, you rub the back of the knife against the block and not the sharp edge! "Keep it simple in the kitchen. If you use quality ingredients, you don't need anything fancy to make food delicious: just a knife, a cutting board, and some good nonstick cookware, and you're set,"" Curtis Stone Chef & TV Presenter

How are Chef Knives made?

Knives are made in two ways; a forged construction or a stamped construction. Stamped knives are cut to shape from cold-rolled steel, heat treated for added strength, sharpened and then polished. Stamped knives are considered to be of a lower quality to forged knives, but some of the world's best premium knives feature a stamped construction. Forged knives are made by a very intricate, complex and multi-step process. Often made by hand, forged knives are of the highest quality; a chunk of powdered or solid steel alloy is heated until it glows white hot and is then hammered to form its shape, much like medieval blacksmithing. The blade is then heated above critical temperature, quenched and tempered to the desired hardness. After forging and heat-treating, the blade is polished and sharpened. Forged blades are typically thicker and heavier than stamped blades.

What knives do you need?

My favourite knives have always been my 20cm chefs knife and a 25cm Genoise. I have now had both of them from my restaurant days back in the mid 1980's. The Genoise in particular has been incredible. You can use it for just about every knife function, as a palette knife, for plating up items once they have been cut. It has held its edge for all these years and only occasionally requires sharpening. I don't know what I would do without it!

Chefs/Cooks Knife

The cook's knife, also known as the chef's knife, is the go-to knife for many chefs. Generally much longer and heavier than other knives, it is an extremely versatile knife. Chefs often spend the most money and time when buying their cook's knife.

Choppers and Cleavers

The biggest of the knives, choppers and cleavers feature a large rectangular blade and are designed for chopping thick slabs of meat or bone with ease, but can also be used to make light work of large vegetables. A large handle will provide you with good leverage for a stronger chopping action, whilst also ensuring your hands are well clear of any danger.

Fillet Knife

Featuring a long and flexible blade, fillet knives are ideal for reaching parts of meat that are difficult with a large cook's knife. Fillet knifes, so appropriately named, are perfect for filleting fish as they can glides past the small bones to get at all the flesh possible. Their delicate and flexible design makes them unsuitable for chopping.

Boning Knife

Boning knives feature a stiff blade that makes them well designed for removing meat from bones. They can be used with an underhand and overhand grip, often used by butchers when jointing hanging cuts.

Bread Knife

Bread knives have a sharp serrated blade that easily cuts through tough bread crusts and usually feature a long blade for carving.

Paring Knife

Paring knives are small versions of cooks knives, allowing you to carry out general slicing, chopping and mincing but their smaller sizes makes them ideal for doing more intricate work.

Santoku Knife

Santoku knives are gaining more and more popularity in recent years. While they originated from Japan and feature a sheepsfoot tip design with an angle approaching 60 degrees at the tip, most of the reputable knife companies are offering their own versions of this style of knife. Designed for slicing, dicing and mincing and featuring a blade and handle that are almost perfectly balanced, these knives are extremely easy to use.

Keeping your knife sharp

As important as it is to buy the correct knife, keeping it sharp is paramount for good kitchen craft. Honing and sharpening your knife is very important as it keeps it performing as well as it should, but it also protects you from potential accidents. Blunt knives make it hard to cut food, whereas a sharp knife does all the hard work for you and glides through food.