Soft edges produce excellent flesh cutting blades?

R

Ross99

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May 31, 2011
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I was running around the internet and came across a post or comment stating that soft knives produce aggressive long tooth edges that work very well on flesh. I can't seem to find this post and wonder if anyone could give me a link to this information. I have searched to no avail. Any thoughts on this?

Thanks,
Ross
 
Depends on what kind of flesh and what kind of cut you want to make.

If you wanted a weapon, jagged toothy edges are best, if you want clean smooth cuts, very hard steel is needed.
 
Sharpening at the farmers market has been very interesting.
I've talked to career butchers who said this, and others who preferred dull knives. Seriously. Good butchers who prefer dull knives.
Being a cook, not a butcher, I just shrug and say, "There's a lot I don't know."
 
The soft temper/toothy edge thing does have some merit, if you simply want to sharpen your knife on a coarse stone very often, and tear through soft material. Might as well go one step farther and use a serrated bread knife to carve a roast.

Personally, for fleshy work (and every other kind of work) I prefer a crisp edge on hard steel, because it cuts cleaner with less effort and stays that way longer. *shrug*
 
James beat me to it.

This "folk wisdom" is based on simple sharpening devices and simple steel knives. A very hard knife was harder to sharpen well and also broke easily. A softer knife was easy to sharpen and lasted longer...thus "A softer knife is better". The toothy edge on a freshly sharpened softer knife would indeed seem very sharp and cut meat well. To a butcher that was great. The fact that he re-sharpened his blades daily( or several times a day) was not an issue to him, as sharpening his knives was part of the job. That is why most old butcher knives look like fillet/boner blades. They have been re-sharpened so many times that not much blade is left.

With the dawn of better modern steel and better manufacturing, the harder knives were the same price as the softer ones, and they replaced them because the edges lasted longer. A hard, properly sharpened blade will cut longer than a softer blade.

None of that will make old lore go away. Lawnmower blades, old saw blades, forging facing north, Jim Bowie's knife was made from a melted meteorite, etc. ....... I still regularly read that lard is the best quenchant ( at one time, it probably was).
 
That's a new one (to me). Silly as the two before me mentioned.

Serrated yuck. Toothy edges are achieved by how you sharpen. It has nothing to do with hardness. I have a really old "Old Hickory" that I use a lot in the kitchen. It's a good knife, but the steel is soft and needs sharpened often. I have other knives that have 20° (inclusive) polished edges and they cut every bit as good as a toothy edge. The argument is usually slightly toothy for things like tomatoes where a mirror polished edge can "skate" on the skin, or fibrous materials (like meat) where the teeth cut those fibers like a (micro) saw.

A toothy edge doesn't mean ugly jagged edges either. Properly done, the only evidence is a non polished bevel. If I do decide to go toothy, I sharpen on a 400 grit SiC stone, and follow it up on the strop.

The argument for soft steel is nonsense in my way of thinking.
 
I think that many confuse the easy ability to easily restore an edge, or raise a fast wire edge quickly with a knife staying sharp. Softer steel can be restored fast by a quick steeling. Harder steel can chip on bone. Thin hard steel can be chipped when steeled (I'm thinking of posts by people steeling very hard thin steel and encountering micro chipping).

I think some are confused.

I can see, some one who cuts meat all day, banging and scraping against bone, might prefer a blade that won't chip, and is easy to steel back to a biting sharp edge.

I have butchered a cow, and we steeled often. When butchering an elk, I used harder modern steel. The other gentlemen was using mystery stainless steel. He did not steel, he used a carbide V scraper (pull throug sharpener) many times.
 
72 RC Tungsten Carbide on Titanium (about 44 RC) cuts meat very well but much different than a fine grained edge... very aggressive.
 
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