Kiritsuke

While it is very likely that kiritsuke is one of the most beautiful knives you will ever see, we want to warn you right away that this form of the knife is intended for more experienced chefs. It is made only by very experienced masters. This knife is considered a symbol of seniority and mastered cutting techniques in top Japanese restaurants. If you work in the kitchen and use kiritsuke, you are probably the chef of all chefs.

On this occasion, we would like to warn you again how important it is to apply the right shape of the blade in order to successfully complete the job of processing certain foods. Don’t buy a knife just because you like its shape. Choose a knife suitable for your needs. If you need advice, we will be happy to help.

The Kiritsuke knives we offer are sharpened on both sides of the blade. For practical reasons. Traditional kiritsuke knives have a blade sharpened on one side only. This allows them to achieve incredible sharpness and easy gliding through the ingredients they cut, but on the other hand, working with single-sided blades requires getting used to and some experience working with them. Such experience in the western world is mostly owned by professional chefs in top restaurants.

In its form, kiritsuke is a cross between usuba (nakiri) and yanagiba, designed mainly for processing fish and larger fruits and vegetables by pushing and pulling. From yanagiba it took the length and thinner blade and from usuba (nakiri) the height and straight edge of the blade. These knives can be used for filleting fish, as well as for cutting vegetables into very thin slices (julienne style).

Kiritsuke can be 210-330 mm long. High-carbon steels of high hardness are used for their production, which means that they achieve high sharpness. When gaining experience working with it, work slowly keeping in mind that injuries are more common when working with long knives.