Hi, my name's Dan Delavan.
I'm the owner operator of Plaza Cutlery in
Costa Mesa, California.
We have a great selection.
We also have a website, plazacutlery.com.
And today we're going to be talking about
knives.
The Santoku knife is an old Asian knife, primarily
Japanese.
It was made famous by Rachael Ray on her TV
show.
She used the Wusthof Grand Prix knife for
years before moving on.
The Santoku is like a chef's knife, a wider
blade, but instead of rocking it's more of
a chopper.
So it has a very slight curve, and the tip
curves down to it.
That way when you use it you just use it in
more of an up and down motion or in a cutting
forward motion.
It's high carbon steel, so it does have to
be kept dry and clean because it will rust.
We also have here, again from Japan, this
is a modern Miyabi.
It's distributed by and known by Henckels.
This has their traditional chisel grind where
it's ground on one side, then there's a large
kind of hollow on the back side where it curves
in.
A lot of the Japanese chefs prefer this way
so when they look down the blade they know
exactly where the cutting edge is.
Whereas in a lot of western knives the blade
will be more centered, so they'll be off a
few degrees.
Shows how precise the Japanese like to be.
This particular one has also got a steel bolster
and is modernized with a Micarta handle, so
it's heavy.
But again, you still have the curve down wide
blade for chopping.
This is the Wusthof Grand Prix.
This was the original Rachael Ray knife.
The Granton edge keeps things from sticking
to it.
You have the curved down wide blade.
This one, with the Grand Prix, you have the
rounded handle, and it has a little hump back
in there so when you grip it it sits in your
palm real nice.
Another Santoku we have here is the Kyocera.
This one's quite a bit different.
This is a ceramic blade.
Kyocera is out of Japan.
The advantage to the ceramic is it's very
hard.
When you cut lettuce, avocados, again avoiding
the seeds because you will damage the blade,
there's no iron.
So being non-ferrous it's not going to change
the color and make the lettuce brown or the
avocado's not going to darken as fast.
So again, you have the wide blade, it curves
down.
It has an ergonomic handle to grip.
But it's extremely light.
It's really like you're not holding anything.
The other advantage to the ceramic is it'll
stay sharp for a very long time because it
is a hard material.
But, you have to be careful with it, if you
do drop it or you pry with it you will either
nick or damage the edge or you will break
it.
And of course, Kyocera doesn't guarantee them
for misuse.
It's not a throwing knife, so you can't drop
it.
