Custom Kitchen Knife Came In

[Scandi Grind]

I have been cooking a lot more ever since my family moved out of the exploding city to a smaller town. There's not as many restaurants and many of us have health issues that don't need to be aggravated by fast food anyway, plus it is actually possible to get to the grocery store out here, it's only five minutes away! Back where I used to live, it wasn't any farther, but traffic was so bad it took 45 minutes instead of 10 to get there and back.

Anyway, the point is I've been cooking more, and being a knife guy it was only a matter of time before I discovered premium kitchen cutlery. I went down the rabbit hole of Japanese made knives, bought a factory made Santoku, two hand made Gyutos, a couple whetstones, then sold off two knives to make up the funds to have a American custom knife maker make a Gyuto to my specifications. I've only had it for two days, but it promises to be my primary kitchen knife for years to come!

It is 225mm long, 52mm tall, about 3.2mm at the spine, with 80crV2 carbon steel at 62hrc. The profile is basically a taller, longer version of a Kurosaki Raijin, the grind is a high full convex, and the handle is an octagonal sandwich construction with reddish wood laminate scales and white paper micarta liner and frame. It weighs in at about 7.84 oz.

[miohin]

Wow, that's beautiful - looks like it'll be a joy to cook with.

[standy99]

I make a Petty in 80CrV2. You will find it a dream to sharpen. Not the best for corrosion so no leaving in the sink.

[ChrisinHove]

That’s *very* nice!

[Scandi Grind]

I make a Petty in 80CrV2. You will find it a dream to sharpen. Not the best for corrosion so no leaving in the sink.

My first Japanese knife was stainless, I was a little afraid of carbon in the kitchen despite the fact that I was quite fond of carbon in my outdoors knives. My second purchase though I wanted to learn to take care of carbon steel so I bought just about the most reactive thing you can get, an iron clad Gyuto in White #1. I found that iron cladding is even more reactive than the steel! It was a bit annoying at first, but that was largely due to me getting a feel for what was just patina and what was rust. Turns out rust was usually pretty obvious and the rest was fine. After a lot of vegetable use, including plenty of onions, I used that Gyuto on some roasted chicken for the first time and that finally put a thick enough patina on it that I don't hardly ever see rust any more as long as I wash the blade promptly after use. Now that I am comfortable with it's quirks, I love carbon steel in the kitchen, and I love the patina I get with it!

This custom is a mono-steel, no iron cladding, so it feels pretty trivial to take care of even though I haven't built up a patina yet. My iron clad also had a black korouchi finish on most of the blade face, so it was limited in how much area would patina, my custom practically has a whole canvas to work with!