Article by Sandra Tiffany
Copyright (c) 2011 Sandra Tiffany
Some of the world's best knives come from Japan. Why is that, you may ask? Well, Japanese food is prepared with exacting standards and needs to be cut with essential techniques. For example, the preparation of sushi and other delicious delicacies, needs to be cut with accuracy to create a visual masterpiece.
Japanese kitchen knives are forged by a system that creates razor sharp edges and gives the knives their feather like weight. These knives will perform extremely well in the kitchen, and will slice through their given task with ease.
Originally, these well crafted knives were created from the same carbon steel as the famous Katana or war sword. These knives contained an inner core of hard and brittle carbon steel. They had a thick layer of soft and ductile steel surrounding the core, so that the hard steel is only exposed at the cutting edge. Because the steel was harder, it was possible to sharpen the edge to a more acute angle that would allow cutting to be done more effectively and accurately.
Western swords would not hold up to such a sword, because of the softer steels that were used in the West. Today, stainless steel is more than often used for Japanese kitchen knives.
The modern day Japanese knife can be traced back to the Edo Period (1603-1867)/ Genroku Era (1688-1704) where the first Deba Bocho was crafted and used. Deba Bocho is a style of kitchen knife that was used for cutting fish, chicken, and meat during this time in Sakai. Using the combination of modern machinery and traditional hand crafted tools, we obtain a quality stain resistant carbon steel blade for our modern Japanese kitchen knife.
Today, Seki is considered the home of modern Japanese kitchen cutlery. Only state of the art manufacturing and technology is used along with ancient forging skills to create a world class serious of stainless steel kitchen knives that are known throughout the world. With its thin blade designs, the Japanese kitchen knives can offer advantages that the Western knives do not. The first advantage is that the harder steel can support a sharper edge. The second advantage is that the thinner blade is lighter and produces less fatigue. The third advantage is that it is easier to balance a thinner blade.
Western knives have a long full bolster that is not necessary and can weigh down a chef during the preparation process. With a smaller bolster, Japanese kitchen knives do not get in the way of the heel of the blade, which makes the blade easier to sharpen and maintain and to use for the preparation of sushi and other delicacies.