Japanese Paring Knife 4-Inch High Carbon Stainless Steel Fruit Knife with Wooden Handle and Sheath Small Utility Kitchen

Clean, sharp and great form factor. Easy maintenance, just standard hand washing. Rust resistance and retains is edge well. Soft handle wood makes it easy to handle and is easy on the hands. Nothing flashy but a great work horse knife. Use it daily for proteins and soft vegetables in smaller portions meals. Read more

This is an excellent Chinese chef's knife. It is very light and can be sharpened to a razor edge. The steel is not as hard as some Japanese knives, but not quite as soft as the typical western chef's knife. This is a good balance - it stays very sharp under heavy use but you can still easily maintain the edge at home. Harder steels are harder to sharpen and this does not suffer from that issue. It arrives with the typical Japanese "factory" edge so will need to have a proper "Western" edge put on by a knowledgeable knife sharpener. Be aware that it is a Japanese knife making tradition to not presume to know the kind of edge that you, the customer, want. Once that edge is on, you can maintain it to razor sharpness using a ceramic honing rod. Do not use a steel honing rod - if you have one, please throw it away as they are not really recommended anymore for maintaining an edge. It is not made of the same kind of stainless steel that many European knives are made from and it will rust if you leave it soaking or with water/food on it for prolonged periods. Also, be aware that it is not a cleaver - those are made of thicker, softer steel, have much more weight, are sharpened to an axe edge, and are intended for cutting hard items like bones and coconuts. All in all, this is an excellent chef's knife for the price. I use it daily and love it. My knife-shop sharpener who used to be a chef also loves it and thinks it's a great deal. More tips: When you have it sharpened, have the spine rounded so that it does not cause a callus to form on your knife hand. Un-rounded spines are common among all knives except for very high end (expensive) ones. I also find it is well-suited to use with a pinch-grip. Read more

Firstly, I should say that I'm a bit of a knife snob, have an enormous stable ranging from top-dollar Japanese knives to free things I've gotten at the supermarket. While this isn't a knife I would begin to compare with high end boutique knives, I think it does have a great deal of merit, especially for a stainless steel knife, which I've come to hate over the years. Anyway, this being my first foray into this style of Chinese vegetable cleavers, I wanted to try something relatively well-reviewed that would answer the question of whether or not it was something I should invest in more seriously. Out of the box, this knife was sharp. I wasn't about to try it for shaving, but within reasonable limits. People have stated in previous reviews that the tang bolt is uncomfortable in the hand, and while I understand that if you were planning to take apart a pig with it using brute force, that's not the intended use for this knife. Holding the blade with your thumb and forefinger, as one should with this style of knife, predominantly using the handle for balance, the stud doesn't even touch my large hands. Another item to address is the pattern on the blade. As with other knives from the lower end of my collection, there are often finishes intended to be decorative, but which detract from the performance of the knives. Again, consistent with this crowd, I have found that the simple process of cleaning the knife removes the sticky finish in short order, exposing the steel beneath, and resolving this issue. Of note, I clean the flats of my knives with a plastic scouring pad, which not only removes discoloration on high carbon steel blades, but also makes short work of these "decorative" finishes. Once I had the edge tuned up and the finish largely removed, this knife began to show its colors. It's actually a very sturdy knife. I greatly enjoy the large flat of the blade for sweeping and carrying large amounts of food to the pan, etc. I also wouldn't hesitate to use it for moderate butchering through raw bone, as it does have a bit of weight to it in addition to solidity. As I used it more, I began to be bothered by a point on the spine where it meets the handle. There it projected slightly, and definitely began to chew up my hand a bit. That said, I took the knife out to the garage, rounded the corner with my rotary tool, and since then this knife has been a workhorse; comfortable in the hand, effective and non-sticky, quick to take an edge and slow to lose it. When gripped properly, it also has a wonderful balance which the price wouldn't suggest. All in all, this is an incredible knife for the price, and I absolutely without hesitation use it over virtually any of my German knives. Despite my bias against stainless, this knife has found a place in my kitchen when stainless is the preferred material. I think for it to be a more true representation of a vegetable chopper, it might benefit from being slightly lighter and faster in the hand, but it is a wonderful performer all the same, which eats up any work in the kitchen. If you are considering expanding your knife collection, and are daunted by the prices some of these fair to middling German knives command, I would definitely recommend this as an eye-opening experience bound to redefine what you pay for in a blade. As for someone just building their kitchen and looking for something better than you can find at a department store, this is it. Bon appetit! Read more