I love santokus

I got Victorinox wood handle santoku that I use for pretty much everything. Not the fanciest knife but very care free and effortless to use.
 
Rather than retype the entire thing, here's a link to a semi-santoku knife in the Cheapskates thread:
RokJok

Post in thread 'Cheapskate Heroes'

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Tomodachi 8" santoku'ish chef's knife by Hampton Forge. Well under $10 retail new. I inevitably found this one at a thrift store. So price was very likely $3 tops.

But it can be honed to stupid sharp. Steel feels soft (no surprise) on diamond plates & a worn old Dexter diamond sharpening rod. A few licks on a fat ceramic rod refines the edge even more.

Handle is ergo enough to be comfortable in hand. The hard plastic has just a touch of satin finish, so hopefully avoids slipperiness. Downside is that the 0.072" (1.8mm) at ricasso blade has very sharp square...
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I just bought a small Masamune Santoku while fishing out on the Bay. Looking forward to using it.
 
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Interesting! Those are some some lovely knives. I've never had much use for santokus myself, but then I have at least a dozen 240mm gyutos. I rarely use anything but a gyuto, just for a few specialized tasks where a suji or petty are required, for for crusty batard.
 
I think this is broadly a santoku? 80crv2 and Tasmanian blackwood
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Small Masamune 5" molybdenum stainless. Very sharp as delivered. Noteworthy is the handle size both in width and depth - quite large for the blade size but well proportioned if you want more control cutting harder items like sweet potatoes etc

Verdict. I like it!

Works great, very cheap discounted with free shipping from Japan. Highly recommend for entry level cooks, quality beater, reduced abuse or theft stress.IMG_20250528_230724604~2.jpgIMG_20250528_231804541~2.jpg
 
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Really enjoying using the 5" Masamune santoku - I forgot to mention that it is double bevel. The handle, as I did mention, is quite large for this size of a knife. I like it as it offers excellent control that would aid cutting harder items like sweet potatoes, beets etc.

This time cabbage, asparagus, onion and potato which it devoured easily. Ground beef, peas, Sunday leftover chuck roast gravy thrown in the pot with it....

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A very rarely used Kyocera ceramic santoku that I got a bit of response from when trying to sharpen it with a 1200 grit diamond rod. I find the ceramic to be an odd material in that before sharpening it didn't feel sharp, but would still cut. It also doesn't seem to respond well to sharpening. It'll be interesting to see if and how the 1200 grit micro-serrations change cutting food, if at all.
 
RokJok said:
Here's a little bit of santoku love for the brotherhood. The top KitchenAid of the matched pair has a rattle in the handle, like a nut or other metal lump was clattering around loose in there. The red rubber handle on the Groovy Boi at the bottom fits my small'ish mitts quite well. The thumb divots just behind the bolster bevels give a natural & intuitive landing zone for the pad of my thumb when using a saber grip.
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I know this is an older post, but I'm curious about that groovetech knife. Do you find it too be overly thick? I've read some reviews on amazon starting the grooves make the knife thicker.
I'm only interested because I want a knife that things like potatoes don't stick to.
 
Stock thickness is 0.044" (1.14mm). It's 0.075" (1.91mm) width across the corrugations. However, at the very edge the corrugations are ground down to the thickness of the metal stock itself.
 
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