Japanese Damascus Steel Knives
Because I like to eat, I like to cook. Because I like to cook, I love knives.
After a bit of prep work, I’ve come to learn that a good knife is pretty much the most important tool in the kitchen. The best knives are from Germany and Japan, from the cities of Solingen and Seki City. German knives are great in a very utilitarian way- they are thicker, have full bolsters, are double beveled, and are crafted of stainless steel. However, I find that German knives lack soul, now that Wusthof and Henckels are the dominant manufacturers making tens of thousands of blades a year. Better German knives are compression forged, where a metal bar is heated red-hot and then pressed into shape, whereas cheaper knives are stamped cold from a sheet. In contrast, the Japanese knife industry still has many craft manufacturers that produce knives with Japanese characteristics. Some of these knives are made with the drop-forged process, where a hot ingot of steel is hammered and pressed into shape. These knives have thinner and lighter blades, are made of powdered steel or carbon steel, and are ground to a narrower, sharper bezel.
This knife probably the sharpest and best-handling knife I’ve ever used. The handle is of western-style construction using abalone shell, but the blade is pure Japanese. There’s no bolster to protect fingers and its remarkably thin. The core of the blade is made with powder steel; it’s extremely hard and long-wearing steel, but a somewhat brittle and not rustproof. The sides of the blade are made with 33 layers of stainless steel, created Damascus-style, where the knife-maker hammers and folds 2 slightly different types of steel into layers as it is being forged. This not only strengthens the steel, but it also creates these beautiful ripples on the surface.
