Best chef's knife for under $200

The ones I would recommend have names you have never heard of. However, I will say that the Hattori above is easily the best one mentioned so far. It balances better than the Shun. If you are going to buy a Japanese gyuto then I suggest getting one that is longer than you expect. They are lighter and weigh less than shorter European knives. So you have the extra length without the extra weight or poor balance.

Using steels is fine, grooved or otherwise. You just need to understand that steeling is not grinding and you need to use no pressure. If you use no pressure a grooved steel or a pot lid will accomplish the same thing.
 
Mick R. said:
If you want to add a "coolness factor" and a knife that will raise eyebrows to your kitchen check out the Kershaw Shun Ken Onion Chef's Knife. Great looking knife with VG-10 steel. It lists for well over $200 dollars but you can get it at Amazon for $160 bucks.
B0007IR2MO.01-A3SPLR0MSOYZ8O._AA280_SCLZZZZZZZ_V63334851_.jpg
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That is the one I want. I may tell my wife to get it for my birthday.
 
hara-kiri-yogi said:
It says in the instructions never to use a steel on the edge, as it will ruin the blade. I guess the instructions are right!
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Huh! Isn't that somethin'?

Don't know that I ever looked at the instructions, or that they even came with any. I should still have the box though, so if it had instructions it should be there.

In any case though, I didn't get a steel until recently, before that they were sharpened with a Lansky or a Sharpmaker, and still wouldn't hold a decent edge.

And anyway, who ever heard of a chef's knife that you couldn't use a steel on? Thats the dumbest thing I ever heard.
 
ginshun said:
Huh! Isn't that somethin'?

Don't know that I ever looked at the instructions, or that they even came with any. I should still have the box though, so if it had instructions it should be there.

In any case though, I didn't get a steel until recently, before that they were sharpened with a Lansky or a Sharpmaker, and still wouldn't hold a decent edge.

And anyway, who ever heard of a chef's knife that you couldn't use a steel on? Thats the dumbest thing I ever heard.
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You can use a steel. Just don't apply pressure. Very simple.
 
Knife Outlet said:
You can use a steel. Just don't apply pressure. Very simple.
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If you don't apply pressure then nothing happens. The amount of force required depends on the angle and the thickness of the edge. I have knives which are so thin than you can actually see them deform if you press even moderately on a benchstone. If you tried it on a steel the edge would just ripple right off, even the weight of the knife is too much. They are < 0.005" thick at 1/16" back from the edge and sharpened at 4 degrees per side.

ginshun said:
And anyway, who ever heard of a chef's knife that you couldn't use a steel on? Thats the dumbest thing I ever heard.
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This warning is mainly due to grooved steels being used hard to act as files. If you try this with the very hard and thin edges on some of the better cutting knives they literally explode under the steel.

In general steeling an edge will seriously degrade the edge retention because the steel is deformed and weakened and will thus deform again much more readily than when it was freshly sharpened.

-Cliff
 
Knife Outlet said:
You can use a steel. Just don't apply pressure. Very simple.
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That is what I do, the steel is just for staightening the edge out, not shapening, I know that.

But for a set of knife instructions to specifically say to not use a steel or not use a groved steel or whatever it says is still a bit shady IMO. Sounds like an excuse to make a crappy knife to me.

Customer - "This knife doesn't hold an edge"
Manufac. - "Well did you use a steel on it?"
Customer - "Of course its a Chefs knife"
Manufac. - "Oh well you should have read the directions, you can't do that because it ruins the edge, sorry but there is nothing w can do now"

Ya right.
 
I agree. Does sound like a real character flaw in a chef's knife. My friend uses his steel "like a file" and I swear he is complimented on the edge by every user.
 
Cliff Stamp said:
If you don't apply pressure then nothing happens. The amount of force required depends on the angle and the thickness of the edge. I have knives which are so thin than you can actually see them deform if you press even moderately on a benchstone. If you tried it on a steel the edge would just ripple right off, even the weight of the knife is too much. They are < 0.005" thick at 1/16" back from the edge and sharpened at 4 degrees per side.

-Cliff
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I simply disagree. I've steeled way, way, way too many chef knives not to understand what the effects of steeling are. I have nothing but high tech, hard bladed Japanese knives in my block. I steel them regularly in between sharpenings. I don't get torn edges.

If the blade is ground to too acute an angle, then that is a problem related to grinding the edge, not to steeling. If a steel will rip off an edge with only the weight of the knife as pressure, then the edge is wrong for the purpose.
 
Cliff Stamp said:
If you don't apply pressure then nothing happens. The amount of force required depends on the angle and the thickness of the edge. I have knives which are so thin than you can actually see them deform if you press even moderately on a benchstone. If you tried it on a steel the edge would just ripple right off, even the weight of the knife is too much. They are < 0.005" thick at 1/16" back from the edge and sharpened at 4 degrees per side.

-Cliff
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What do you use that knife for?
 
ginshun said:
What do you use that knife for?
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Ropes, cardboard, foods, etc. . Most of my EDC knives are not significantly thicker, the primary edge grind is usually 7-8 degrees, lower on the hollow grinds, 4-6 degrees. I only go up to about 12-14 for the choppers, and only that far if I intend them for very hard work, limbing dead woods, splitting knotty woods, etc. .

You need really hard and ideally fine grained steels to work well at these profiles. You can grind the coarse ones that thin, but they won't take a high polish and the fracture readily when you cut as the carbides tear out. They make good slicing blades though.

Knife Outlet said:
I've steeled way, way, way too many chef knives not to understand what the effects of steeling are. I have nothing but high tech, hard bladed Japanese knives in my block. I steel them regularly in between sharpenings. I don't get torn edges.
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Fred, you were the one arguing on rec.knives that you didn't see any value in harder steels because you didn't value edge retention and they all cut the same in blind tests. You prefered softer steels *because* they responded better to steeling than the harder knives. These are your words. .

I was the one, along with Alvin and others to present the arguement to you that the harder steels can be ground finer and thus offer higher cutting ability, so it is kind of insensible to try to present this information to me as your unique perspective which you have gathered from extensive experience with hard knives.

If the blade is ground to too acute an angle, then that is a problem related to grinding the edge, not to steeling. If a steel will rip off an edge with only the weight of the knife as pressure, then the edge is wrong for the purpose.
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The edge isn't suitable for steeling, however that isn't what it was designed it to do. A steel puts the edge of the knife under a massive magnification of force because it isolates the load onto a small area against an object when isn't very compressible.

-Cliff
 
Attaboy, Cliff. Go to the archives and pick something I said years ago in another venue in a different context that has nothing to do with the subject at hand. I simply disagree with you. Get over it.
 
Fred, you spent years on rec.knives arguing how harder knives had no value in the kitchen and softer was better because they responded better to steeling and that you should steel with every use. This was only a few years back. This was also when you would not regrind edge angles and were using everything stock. So yeah, when you start lecturing me on how to maintain very hard edges and their value in knives it is kind of absurd.

As for your comments on steeling, edges will deform under steeling not simply as a function of how much force you apply but the weight of the knife, the angle of the edge, the thickness and how often it is steeled. You can ripple an edge just as easily with repeated light passes as you can with infrequent heavy ones. This isn't opinion Fred, just facts and logic.

You were wrong as you implied that the weight of the knife alone is the only criteria. I have kitchen knives at about 20 grams, considering that a chef's knife can easily be ten times as heavy it should be obvious that using the weight of the knife isn't an ideal solution. If it works on the light knife then obviously it is ten times too much force on the chef's knife. Some of the larger blades you have to pull back on and some of the really light ones you have to push into it. It also depends on the steel, the angle, the thickness of the edge, etc. .


-Cliff
 
Try www.japanesechefsknife.com , www.epicureanedge.com or www.paulsfinest.com

Be careful with the fancy Shun/Onion, I've heard bad things.

Mind you, I'm the garde manger/entremetier of a very fine restaurant where we brutalize our knives and I use the set (Profinox) I got from culinary school.

I did buy an Hattori for my professor/chef though and it was great.

Wusthof Cordon Bleus, Globals, Shuns, Misonos and Henckels I find are popular, but for my money (when I actually have some) it's gonna be an Hattori.
 
For chef's knives, I've got 4 Friedrich Dick knives I bought 20 years ago. They have been really great users, no problems sharpening, and still the ones I reach for every time.

For coolness value (and I'm sure they are practical too but I've never held or used one), I just love the pic of that hattori.

Cheers
Phillip
 
I've been using a Henckel's chef's knife, 4 star, almost daily for about 15 years. I love it. I touch it up occasionally with a Henckel's steel and once in a while with a ceramic stick. I've never actually sharpened it but it's still perfect and goes right through tomatoes which I find to be the test of a good cook's knife. I've also been using a Henckel's Santoku courtesy of my son for about 2 years, 5 star, and really like it but keep going back to the plain chef's knife. My wife prefers the Henckel's boning knife as a general purpose cook's knife as it's lighter and handier. It too only gets the steel and stick occasionally and remains perfectly sharp.
 
I retired my Henckels and use www.agrussell.com version of the Shun . They are great .I sharpen with either a fine diamond rod or a grooved steel .They haven't exploded yet !!
 
If you have the time try a flea market. My brother found an old used carbon steel Sabatier chef knife (approx 9") dirt cheap at a flea market and gave it to me. It needed a little cleaning and restoration. For me it works better than the many knives I have spent a lot of money buying. It has a somewhat flexible distal tapered blade that seems to cut everything on the board with only a slight push and also works well as a slicing knife. I have not tried the more recent Sabatier knives, but have been told by a reliable source (the chef who taught knife skills class) that they are not as good as the old ones.
 
Cliff Stamp said:
Fred, you spent years on rec.knives arguing how harder knives had no value in the kitchen and softer was better because they responded better to steeling and that you should steel with every use. This was only a few years back. This was also when you would not regrind edge angles and were using everything stock. So yeah, when you start lecturing me on how to maintain very hard edges and their value in knives it is kind of absurd.

As for your comments on steeling, edges will deform under steeling not simply as a function of how much force you apply but the weight of the knife, the angle of the edge, the thickness and how often it is steeled. You can ripple an edge just as easily with repeated light passes as you can with infrequent heavy ones. This isn't opinion Fred, just facts and logic.

You were wrong as you implied that the weight of the knife alone is the only criteria. I have kitchen knives at about 20 grams, considering that a chef's knife can easily be ten times as heavy it should be obvious that using the weight of the knife isn't an ideal solution. If it works on the light knife then obviously it is ten times too much force on the chef's knife. Some of the larger blades you have to pull back on and some of the really light ones you have to push into it. It also depends on the steel, the angle, the thickness of the edge, etc. .


-Cliff
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What is more absurd, Cliff, is your lambasting steels and using an example of a extremely acute blade that would be completely inappropriate for use on a cutting board in the first place. Cliff, I promise to stop disagreeing with you. It isn't worth the hassle. So, you win.
 
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