Speak Up

Monday, July 27, 2009

Matter of Knife and Death


No tool is as useful and necessary to the chef as his knife. Before Erik was a chef I knew nothing about knives. And now, well, I still know next to nothing but I'm certainly more aware of the styles, purposes, and different types of steels used. I also know they cost a lot, but thank goodness for tax write-offs. And because of the durability of the knives, Erik doesn't need to buy a new one that often. I'd say he splurges on a new knife every 4 or 5 years, but when he does I hold my breath at the final cost. These knives are made of all kinds of crazy steel and then gone through some crazy process to make them hard as rocks so they don't come cheap. Last week Erik headed over to his favorite knife store: Korin. Chef or not, this store is worth a visit. They have the most beautiful and unique knives as well as tableware, cookbooks, and sushi bar items.

He came out with a 240 millimeter Suisin Damascus Ginsan-Ko Gyutou with and ebony and silver handle, engraved with his name, a sharpening stone, and these awesome Japanese scrubbers called Sandclean, for cleaning pots and pans. I tried them on the caked on grease on my stainless steal pots and they are spotless! And I didn't even use any cleaning products. It kind of looks like a crazy sea creature and it feels like sandpaper, but it works great!
I seemed to get sidetracked with the scrubbers, but the knives just don't excite me like they do for Erik.
Food is Love,
Hilary

3 comments:

Tiger Lily said...

Be happy he's not a lefty, like my hubby...they tack on 20% to cost!

Gabrielle said...

I used my husband's knife while he was doing the corporate thing and now both are back in a restaurant!

I didn't anticipate how much i would miss the knife!!

he keeps promising me my own, shipped in from japan just like his...but maybe i'll check out this store instead. thanks!

Anonymous said...

I gave my chef for his birthday last year 2 Kasumis, and I inherited his "old" Globals. They are officially his babies now and it will be hard to top the present this year... how do you top the knives that are the key to his career, that he uses every single day?