Reddit reviews Deba-Style Flexible Thai Knife (#171), Kiwi

A Kiwi will serve you well. You can find them at Asian markets, usually less than $10. They have a nice thin blade that's good for sushi, stays sharp and sharpens easily. I have a few $300+ knives in my bag and I still love my Kiwis.

Kiwi Flexible Thai Knife - $6.99 (Stainless)

If you don't want to sharpen that, just buy an inexpensive kitchen utility knife and bring it in.

Here are some options:

Kiwi knife.

Victorinox utility knife.

Ceramic utility knife.

Your boss is right. You work at a produce market, you should not be using a RAT 1 to cut corn.

I have plugged this before but I can't recommend it enough, so here it is again.

The best $7 knife you will ever own

I've been cooking for a while. I own a lot of knives. I have a pretty full kit. I use this knife for almost everything I do professionally.

I personally prefer a utility knife for light weight cutting (I prefer to chop, rather than roll, so a light knife helps). The things that make a utility knife good are a thin, flexible blade, no longer than 6" that will take but not necessarily hold a good edge. All of these qualities also make a knife really fuckin cheap because you aren't paying big bux for a huge lump of high carbon steel.

So why does everyone fork out $80+ for a fancy pattern welded steel shun 6" utility?

Just doesn't make sense. These knives come wicked sharp right out of the package, and for $7 a piece once you've beat it up (and for $7 a piece, you can beat it the fuck up) you just throw it away and buy another.

It may feel like cheating, or that there's a catch, but I haven't found one. They are really solid, dependable, inexpensive knives that you can absolutely trust to do what you need them to do. For the price I think everyone should give these a shot.

Plus you can impress and terrify your family once you learn to cut vegetables Japanese style. Very flashy, very fast, very scary for someone who doesn't know how to drive a knife properly.

Edit:

To clarify a later comment, I took a video of what I'm (possibly erroneously? really not sure) describing as "japanese style" cutting. Really, I'm just calling it that based on how I see chefs using santoku knives.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZFic0GabkM&feature=youtu.be

Tatercam quality, sloppy cut, and turn your speakers down because it is loud. Gives a more clear picture of what I'm describing though. This is what I prefer, contrary to the typical "roll" cut where you keep the tip on the board and move the knife like a piston. For a roll cut, a longer, heavier blade is preferable because you can leverage the weight easier. However, I think that this method will ultimately make you much faster with lightweight cutting (small carrots, soft veg like onions and zucchini, etc) and is worth picking up a cheap, light knife to learn.

tl;dr $7 knife works for cutting most stuff fast; buy it

Both of your links are reference links. Change them to:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0079R1BN2
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003LIX4QA

Good? no... cheap and sharp? Fuck yes

This

Is the knife that you can find most often at asian stores, if you're paying more than $3-$4 it's too expensive. They come decently sharp, very easy to resharpen (seriously I practiced sharpening with these so I wouldn't ruin my good knives)

They bend really easily, the tips tend to warp over time, any heavy chopping will nick the blade. But I have 20 of them for that reason, once they get nicked or start to bend at the tip, they're trash ( I originally got them because I didn't have the money for the nice knives out there, now I keep them around to practice sharpening)

These are actually pretty great, and so cheap that you could just replace them every year when get dull (I actually learned about them from a professional chef who does just that, tossing them instead of paying to have them sharpened).

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B003LIX4QA/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1377837599&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX110_SY165

>kramer meiji

Alright so I've got a great 8" stealth Messermeister chef knife I love (http://a.co/d/04Forve) and a Kiwi 6" (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003LIX4QA/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1)that is cheap but I really like it.

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Would you recommend that I go with the 6" Kramer Meiji or the 8"?

I've been using Kiwi knives for years. They are incredibly cheap and razor sharp. I buy them at Asian supermarkets for around $5, but they can be found on the internet too (for a little more money). I own the square santoku, the pairing knife, and the pointy slightly curved one. Coupled with a diamond steel I bought at home depot a decade ago I spent less than $50 total. The edge on these knives is very thin and easily damaged (like a razor), but this was only a problem when I lived with roommates who would jam my knives in with the silverware in the dish rack...not so much with proper handling. I made blade covers out of cereal box cardboard and scotch tape when we were traveling in our rv, and I keep them in a knife block when I'm at home.

I also own a few really expensive knives from my cheffing days. I originally bought the Kiwi knives so I wouldn't care about them getting ruined by improper handling, now the fancy stuff just stays in the block.

edit:also worth noting is that I have never sharpened these knives (6+years), but I do use the diamond steel on them about once a week.

Something like this is a bit shorter but still has a wide blade that will allow you to use proper technique. And it has the benefit of only being $7 if you don’t like it:

Deba-Style Flexible Thai Knife (#171), Kiwi https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003LIX4QA/