TBE guys are wrong - Opinel isn't the best apple slicer...

[Lesknife]

I’ve never had trouble slicing an apple with my Buck 110 or a 303.

 

[Wowbagger]

I’ve never had trouble slicing an apple with my Buck 110 or a 303.

Some how I suspect you get mistaken for Arnold fairly regularly ?

 

[Therom]

IMO both SAK and Opinel are good enough at slicing apples
And one being better at slicing apple would not make the other bad at this task

 

[BatJak]

try a more powerful steel

 

[onekerf]

I use serrated blades on tomatoes. Works great on really ripe, soft ones, especially in the absence of a sharp plain edged blade. I imagine that with a serrated blade, you would be "sawing" through an apple, and would be creating a tiny amount of raw apple "sauce dust" from the cut's kerf.

 

[Deinos]

Medford knives exel when one's goal is apple sauce.

Thanks... you just wasted good bourbon... hope you are proud of yourself...

 

[CanadaKnifeGuy]

Oh man...now are we talking a mealy apple, crisp apple, type of apple, size of apple...this thread has trouble written all over it. Lol.

I'm exclusively a Granny Smith guy. They are widely regarded as the healthiest apple. Tart too!

They are also very hard / dense, compared to most other apples.

Slice an apple? Why?
I just bite chunks out of them on the ultra rare occations (once or twice every three or five years) that I eat one.

I had a huge beard and massive moustache... So apple slices are easier.

The SAK is not actually pre-cracking the apple, but that's the best guess I could come up with to explain why it's cutting so well and even better than the Opinel no.6

Are all of the 93mm SAK blades "offset" to fit another tool beside it? One side is perfectly straight and all of the distal taper is on one side.

It makes it a bit of a triangular bayonet for slicing. It seems like the thin tip and belly is doing the work and the rear section is lightly prying open the apple and reducing drag.

The Alox Electrician also has a very satisfying click shut and stiffer backspring then the regular 91mm ones.

It'll be with me for a long time.

Fits the pocket sheath great and I'm hoping to eat apples, whenever I crave something sweet.

 

[James Y]

I have no trouble easily slicing apples with my Victorinox Spartan or Pioneer, and they aren’t “chopping” the apples. I also have no problems slicing apples with my Spyderco Military or PM2 (with much thicker blades than the SAKs); or my CRK Insingo and small Inkosi.

The only knives of mine I ever felt were wedge-like and not so good for cutting apples were my Emerson CQC7A knives.

Jim

 

[afishhunter]

CanadaKnifeGuy
My beard is presently only a bit over 3 hands long. I had to trim it last week.

 

[LastRodeo]

I eat one nearly daily. I don't like chomping on an apple if I can help it. If I'm our campimg/Hiking or at an outdoor event, I may not slice up an apple (depends on location, and if I have a paper towel kr paper plate) but I much prefer eating slices of apples one at a time.

In my house we go through 4-5 apples a day for kid snacks. They also prefer slices. So does the dog... cant just toss him an apple whole...


On a side note, I also like to cut corn off the cob.... eat watermelon cut off the rind, and generally use utensils for much of my eating.

I eat cheetos with a fork, or chopsticks to keep the fingers clean!!

I prefer to cut my Snickers bars into pieces with a knife and fork.

 

[NWPilgrim]

I use serrated blades on tomatoes. Works great on really ripe, soft ones, especially in the absence of a sharp plain edged blade. I imagine that with a serrated blade, you would be "sawing" through an apple, and would be creating a tiny amount of raw apple "sauce dust" from the cut's kerf.

Funny, I just discovered this recently. I shied away from serrated blades for decades. But recently got a serrated edge Spyderco Pacific Salt due to some thoughtful reviews. Happened to try it on a slightly over ripe tomato and it was superb. Very thin and even slices. Also works great on slicing hard boiled eggs without breaking up the yolk in the slices.

 

[CanadaKnifeGuy]

I've used my serrated Salt 2 on apples before and the serrations made it far from ideal with the semi-circular cut that is used on apples and on top of that, they are chisel-cut, so the blade wanders to the right.

Didn't rust, tho!

 

[Officer's Match]

I have no trouble easily slicing apples with my Victorinox Spartan or Pioneer, and they aren’t “chopping” the apples. I also have no problems slicing apples with my Spyderco Military or PM2 (with much thicker blades than the SAKs); or my CRK Insingo and small Inkosi.

The only knives of mine I ever felt were wedge-like and not so good for cutting apples were my Emerson CQC7A knives.

Jim

My CQC-7A slices right thru Granny Smiths on a regular basis.

 

[James Y]

My CQC-7A slices right thru Granny Smiths on a regular basis.

Then I guess your apple-slicing kung fu is better than mine.

Jim

 

[DrRollinstein]

Ive started eating apples on the way to work, so rarely will i have a need to slice them. But i'm sure the saw blade on my leatherman wave will make it interesting.

 

[microbe]

Lots of cutting apples comments, but none on peeling them. Am I the only one that peels fruit with a knife?

 

[uraninite]

I have to disagree too. I have sliced apples so thin with my edc oppie that I could see through them. The blade on a SAK is too thick to allow that,particularly with a crisp October honeycrisp.

 

[Pomsbz]

Lots of cutting apples comments, but none on peeling them. Am I the only one that peels fruit with a knife?

No but I do like to cut off the bruises and a good slicer is great for this task.

 

[Wowbagger]

. . . to the consternation of The Chef I just cut up two apples.
She said "What the hell are you doing you can't eat all that ? !"
I said it will be OK and she just rolled her eyes and waded out of the knife dude quagmire to find something to hopefully distract her from that old nagging conundrum . . . new room mate or psychiatric intervention.

anyway . . .
For controls I added her apple preparer (my old EDC) the Wustoff classic paring knife. I had mirror polished it way back in the day; very thin very shallow edge grind.
Also my Little Monster White Paper Japanese knife.

Also for comparison the Buck 110; it is the old stock geometry.
All the knives are "sharp enough" = able to dig into my thumb nail and not skate across = Shave sharpish / some areas whittling.


As I suspected and as with box knives; right tool for the job and all that; thinner the better . . .
The best at cutting through the entire apple to produce what you see in this photo was the Wustoff by a fair bit, then The Little Monster.
I didn't notice much diff between the Opinel and the Electrician.
The 110 was awful with the slice shooting across the stove and much force involved to perform the cut. The saving grace is the 110 has BY FAR, BY FAR, BY FAR the best handle / ergonomics so that is alright then. Did I mention I absolutely LOVE the 110 handle and ergonomics ?


Moving along . . .
I cut up the slices and stacked the "fingers" side by side on the cutting board and sliced through those to produce cubes.
Between the Op and the El. the El had some edge over the Op for cutting the fingers and the Op tended to cube a bit easier.
The 110 was head and shoulders above both once we didn't have to get that thick spine in the cut; it just sailed through the fingering and cubing. No question better by far.

So bottom line . . . for this apple type . . . I found no great diff between the Opinel and the Electrician as far as ease of cutting.
The blade shape on the El. was better for dissecting the core; I tend to cut the ends of the core off, whittle out the stem and the blossom debris on the other end and eat the rest seeds and all. Today I will be eating two, count 'em, two apple cores. (I have 911 on speed dial).

Best EDC, in pocket, apple preparing choice ? ? ?
Other than putting a sheath around the Whustoff, which I used to do by the way, . . .

Best slicer ? Best handle ?
. . . that would be . . .
. . . a Buck 110 with that awful thick spine ground off.
One of these days I'm going to do just that.

PS: Having great success with water proofing the Opinel pivot from light splashes of water while washing the knife. Candle wax melted and dripped onto the end of the handle and pivot area (only) then melted in with a heat gun on very low.

 

[Wowbagger]

The Chef piped up and started telling me the following. I gave her the wireless key board and said put it all down for posterity so she did :

Different types of apples cut differently Gala apples are nice and crisp and sometimes the pairing knife gets stuck in the middle of the slice Also depends how fresh the apple is. Roma apples are softer texture and slice very easy sometime if older are a bit mealy and that effects the slicing. Honeycrisp apples tend to slice like Gala apples - crisp and hard surfaces. Pink Lady apples vary but are mostly crisp. Red Delicious apples mostly have a softer surface like the Romas. Apples fresh off the tree cut differently than store-bought apples because of their freshness. A lot depends on the peel of the apple, in addition to the flesh of the fruit. Any way you slice it, it’s just an apple for god’s sakes! Just cut it and eat it!
END QUOTE

PS : to make matters worse we don’t know what the apples are that I just cut up. She just brought them back from the farmer’s market today.

PPS : they are very firm, crisp and hard.
Not overly large where I fear the small Opinel and the Electrician would choke and take some manipulation to get all the way around the larger apples.