Serrated knives in kitchen?

L

lonestar1979

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I am a fan of plain edges, and have always used them, but recently started using Kuraidori tomato knife(5inch blunt tip serrated blade).This knife is thin and razor sharp,and it cuts vegetables,bread and meat like crazy,tendons and cartilage with sawing motion.It is Chinese knife made with german steel and design,similar to victorinox fibrox knives.Is anyone else using serrated blades in kitchen?All input welcome!
 
The only serrated knife I allow in my kitchen is a bread knife. Serrated knives can be sharpened, but nobody ever does.

Chris
 
Hesparus said:
The only serrated knife I allow in my kitchen is a bread knife. Serrated knives can be sharpened, but nobody ever does.

Chris
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Agree 100%, I see no need for any serrated knife in the kitchen other than a bread knife. I usually use a Santoku to cut tomatoes or other soft veggies but any knife in my block will easily do the job. Well I wouldn't use the bread knife, it's only used for the purpose it was designed.
 
I use cheap serrated steak knives on plates, especially for guests. thats about it :)
 
We have a couple of spyderco ones. My mother in law likes them. My wife used to like them but seems to have moved onto santokus.
 
I sharpen this one on sharpmaker,and it shaves hair easily!Very good all around knife,serrations will rip through anything with ease.Will be getting Spyderco kitchen knife one of these days,maybe even serrated.
 
If serrated knives work for you, then go for it. To elaborate on my original comment, here is a more complete list of reasons why I don't like serrations on my kitchen knives:
1) as I said, they don't sharpen well. Serrations can be sharpened, of course, but they have to be done individually. I don't know how long that takes for a kitchen-sized knife. My 9" gyuto takes less than a minute to get the whole edge back in shape.
2) I believe it was Sal Glesser who sad that serrated investors cut everything better, but they don't cut anything cleanly. In the kitchen, I don't even agree with this. I've used serrated knives to cut tomatoes, and I still vastly prefer a properly sharpened straight edge.
3) Serrated knives cut differently than other knives. They cannot do push cuts against a cutting board, which accounts for about 80% of what I do. Forget chopping herbs easily with a serrated knife.
4) Serrated knives have inferior geometry. Serrations require more thickness behind the edge, which leads to poor cutting performance on more solid objects like potatoes or apples. My knives are in the area of 0.001-0.005" behind the edge, whereas most serrated knives come in closer to 0.02-0.03".

But again, I acknowledge that knives are a very personal thing, and only you know what works best for you. There is no cutlery police that will come to your house and arrest you if they don't like what you're doing.

Chris
 
Hesparus, I completely agree with you. Even for cutting bread I still prefer the straight edge.

Ill also elaborate a little on the serrated steak knives. When you are cutting on a hard dinner plate, the tip of serrations hit the plate and dull, but the majority of the serrations stays sharp and with sawing motion stays pretty effective for a good while.
 
Timos: I'm actually making a straight-edged bread knife right now to see if I like it.
I don't consider steak knives to be kitchen knives, which I why I haven't mentioned them here. I will use a serrated steak knife when I'm cutting against a plate, but I much prefer to use a straight-edged knife and just eat my steak off of a wooden cutting board.

Chris
 
Hesparus said:
Timos: I'm actually making a straight-edged bread knife right now to see if I like it.
I don't consider steak knives to be kitchen knives, which I why I haven't mentioned them here. I will use a serrated steak knife when I'm cutting against a plate, but I much prefer to use a straight-edged knife and just eat my steak off of a wooden cutting board.

Chris
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Agree about the steak knives, mine have mico serations but I don't consider them kitchen knives either. I actually consider them expendable so I don't spend a lot of cash on them.
Good luck with the straight edged bread knife, I'll stick with the serrated myself, I love really crusty bread and I really like a serrated bread knife
 
Hesparus said:
Timos: I'm actually making a straight-edged bread knife right now to see if I like it.
I don't consider steak knives to be kitchen knives, which I why I haven't mentioned them here. I will use a serrated steak knife when I'm cutting against a plate, but I much prefer to use a straight-edged knife and just eat my steak off of a wooden cutting board.

Chris
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I typically eat off the board too :) When there's guests and I have to pretend to be civilized I usually give them a Laguiole or Opinel steak knife.
 
Cool Thread!

I get asked about serrated knives often. Do I make them...."not yet". Do I use them "yes". Why?

Well I see all your view points and take them as valid.....however, I do tend to use serrated knives often in my own kitchen.

It's sort of a misnomer that they are not used in professional kitchen too.

AND, yeah,, they take time to sharpen, but when they are, they excel in come tasks that other knives just do not do as well....
........such as:

> Cutting Crusty Bread of course, especially if it's hot!

> Processing tons of tomatoes for making big batches of salsa!

> Taking the hard skin off a butternut, or any other hard squash when processing it this way as raw to be steamed or baked where you do not want the skin....
...the ability to employ the sawing motion gives way more accuracy and is safer than a plain edge.

> Shredding tons of cabbage when making batches of sauerkraut or creating coleslaw for 120-people !!!....which I just did recently
....Again, with a very sharp serrated knife, the ability to use sort of a 'sawing-pull-cut' that, with dexterity & skill, works far better than almost any plain edge knife for creating ultra-thin shreds of cabbage.

> Taking the zest of citrus fruits.
...I prefer to hand cut the zest than to use a zester in almost any baking or cooking recipe I tend to create....unless I want the zest more open and pasty.
......A serrated knife is again, more nimble and accurate because you can use all those gaps and changing geometry to your advantage and for control.

NOW....

Of course, one can always cultivate the skills with any knife! Serrated of not.

Ultimately I think this is the thing that is overlooked about why kitchen knives are so misunderstood.....because they are so varied!
There are so many different styles from different time periods in history, configurations and construction styles, blade geometries, steels, the list could go on for a LONG-TIME, and in the end....
.......it all boils down to personal preference.

Some like large knives as daily users, some like medium, many like small knives.
Some do detail-cuts, and are into cuisine and culinary art...
Some just need to get that food on the stove, in the oven or in the salad bowl to feed the family.


I own a really cool serrated French knife in my block at home, rarely use that particular knife over the two other serrated knives in my block, but do use it at times and am super glad I have it when I do!
The other two are both bread style knives, one hollow-ground, (this one my zesting machine) the other older Henckels is what I daily open and skin avocados with, & do other things mentioned above and more.

When just out of culinary school, I worked in a kitchen where we had a new employee arrive to be the cold kitchen chef (Garde-Manger) who truly impressed me
with what her main knife choice was, a curved Forschner Bread knife! I saw that lady do everything with it, sharpening it in s steel often and tear-it up....no pun intended;)
She came to our kitchen from hotel Bel-Air, so no slouch either!

_________

To me, this is the really fun part about making kitchen knives, studying them (and believe me, there is a whole world of kitchen knives out there that is always yet to be discovered)
and sharing ideas about them with others.

Anyhow, i think the motto here is use what pleases you!

And...Enjoy cooking!

Blessings of Health and Wellness You All !!!

-DON:)

All well-used but still going strong.
I even bought a back-up of the Henckels that is spanking new despite being over 30-years old...but so was this one when I got it about 8-years ago.

serrated.jpg
 
I recently won several chef knives and other assorted serrated kitchen knives in an eBay auction. Most were heckles, a few I don't know the brand because the logos are worn off but they are decent steel and they performed well with serrations.

However wife asked me to grind off said serrations. Being I always like to tinker with things I did it and I gotta say I prefer a plain edge in the kitchen .

I keep a cheapie 1k/6k permsoaked under my sink in a sealed container because my wife tends to dull knives in the sink or cutting on a plate but on most the knives they can brought back to ridiculous with a 6k stone in a few minutes .
 
Yeah...no doubt the plain edge is KING in the kitchen!

though I like serrated, I'd say they are still "specialty knives" but everyone ought to have at least one in their line-up:)

Glad you got some cool knives and were able to modify them to your liking.
 
I just sharpen my cheapy chefs knife with coarse ish stone and very lightly strop... does well enough for any bread
 
The two knives I use most in the kitchen are a Victorinox Santoku and a Victorinox paring knife, both plain-edged. I also have a third Victorinox kitchen knife with a rounded tip and serrated edge, but I use it less than the others; mostly for preparing certain veggies like broccoli or cauliflower for cooking, and mostly because of its rounded tip, and because it's longer than the paring knife.

Jim
 
Note that most of the answers to the question of serrated knife use include the qualification of "used with a win motion" that is something that is to be avoided as much as possible IMO. A couple for interesting things that I have heard over the last couple of years since I have been studying kitchen knives are he comments that of you want to know how sharp and how good of a cutter you know is, look at how much or how little you cry when you cut onions and how much or how little juice is left on the board when you slice tomatoes. If you want to juice a tomato AND chop up a soda can, grab a Ginsu 2.
 
My only serrated knife is the Tojiro ITK 270mm bread knife. I use it on anything with a hard crust (certain breads, barbecue, and so on) where I don't want to risk abusing my main knive's edges.

For steak, I use my gyuto, of course! No steak knives allowed -- I serve my bison steaks on Epicurean boards, sliced on the bias. A guest at my table should never have to cut their own food, IMO. My main three blades in the kitchen are my gyuro, nakiri, and Chinese slicing cleaver. Everything else is just for rare circumstances that require specialty knives (for example, sashimi).

I never have to "saw" with my knives. Like hesparius, I use push cuts. If that's the case, either the knife or the skill set is deficient :cool:
 
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