Advice on Knives

Believe it or not, I use a $1.00 knife from the dollar store. I sharpen it with a $9.00 hand sharpener from Wal-Mart. In my opinion, there is no real reason to spend a lot of money for expensive knives. I'm sure others will strongly disagree. lol

 

I use a cheap fish filleting knife that's been in the old tackle box for at least twenty years.

 

Heres my opion. Go to a old persons household auction. and buy those old wood handle knives. They usealy are carbon steel. They will take and hold a edge real good. The best doller I have ever spent. I have 7 of them and probly have less then $10 into all of them.

 

The best kit of knives I've had is $17 at walmart, made for butchering deer. Probably only need like two of them from it. I'm on my third kit in about 10 years.

However, I also have a manual knife sharpener with a fine and coarse side. That is what makes them good. Also from Walmart.

Any knife you can sharpen yourself that holds a clean edge is a good knife.

FWIW, I also have a set of Cutco ($$$$$$)knives, the fillet knife included. I still have to sharpen them at the rate I go through knives. They are nice, they hold an edge about twice as long as the cheaper knives, but they still dull after the second deer - I know deer aren't chickens, but meat is meat and a sharp knife makes things easy.

 

The decision to buy a knife depends on what you are using it for. A good knife treated properly will be the last one you ever buy.

I have cheap knives and I have a couple very expensive Wustof's that are well worth the money for the time and effort they save me. It depends on how often I use a knife, and what it's for.

I normally do pithing, so a long cheap fillet knife that I got for .99 cents works just fine for that. I just have to watch the point and make sure I don't try to stick it into a rock or something.

For the kitchen I have my Wusthof's. I have a 6" chef's knife, a paring knife, and a set of shears. That's what I use for butchering chickens into parts when I need to as well as chopping vegetables. They hold an edge like a lifeline, and I can slice through tough meat and reduce a chicken to it's parts in under 2 minutes. Cuts through joints and bones like butter.

That's my two cents on knives. Make sure you keep them clean and dry, cut on soft surfaces, and inspect and sharpen before you start and you'll do fine.

And remember: A sharp knife is a much safer knife!

 

Almost any knife will work fine. But you must keep it sharp. If you don't know how to sharpen a knife with a benchstone or a hand sharpener then spend the money on a good electric sharpener. Sharpen the blade and then keep it sharp.

Sharpness is important not the name brand.

 

the first set of birds we did I bought the contractor knives which snap off for a new sharp edge every 3/4 of an inch... these worked pretty good but I was concerned that there were too many spots for bacteria to hide so we just went out and bought two fileting knives... Simon's is 7" with a molded plastic handle so clean up is safe... he said his was getting dull today at the end of 15 birds... I got a 6" blade but it has a wooden handle, more chances of contamination but I throw in a bit of bleach to clean when done. Mine is still sharpe but we also bought a nice pair is scissors that cuts through bone etc and I was fairly good about remembering to use those rather than the knife, I do not now that Simon was as diligent about using them.

 

Quote:My kill & butchering knife is a old wood handle carbon steel blade paring knife. It's thin but stiff, sharpens easy.