Santoku Knife

The santoku bōchō or bunka bōchō is a general-purpose kitchen knife originating in Japan. Its blade is typically between long, and has a flat edge. The santoku has a sheep's foot-tipped blade that curves down an angle approaching 60 degrees at the point. The bunka bōchō, however, has a k-tip (aka reverse tanto). The term ''santoku'' may refer to the wide variety of ingredients that the knife can handle: fish, meat, and vegetables, or to the tasks it can perform: chopping, dicing, and slicing, with either interpretation indicating a multi-use, general-purpose kitchen knife. The term ''bunka'', refers to how it is used for the cultural food of Japan. The blade and handle of the ''santoku'' are designed to work in harmony by matching the blade's width and weight to the weight of the tang and the handle.

History

The ''santoku'' knife design originated in Japan, where traditionally a ''deba'' knife is used to cut fish, a ''gyuto'' knife is used to cut meat, and a ''nakiri'' knife is used to cut vegetables. This knife was created in the 1940s to combine the three virtues of each of these traditional knives into one universal generalist knife — the ''santoku bōchō''.

Design

''Santoku'' blade geometry incorporates the sheep's foot tip. A sheep's foot design essentially draws the spine ('backstrap') down to the front, with very little clearance above the horizontal cutting plane when the blade is resting naturally from heel to forward cutting edge. Providing a more linear cutting edge, the ''santoku'' has limited 'rocking' travel (in comparison to a German/Western-style chef's knife). The ''santoku'' may be used in a rocking motion; however, very little cutting edge makes contact with the surface due to the extreme radius of the tip and very little 'tip travel' occurs due to the short cantilever span from contact landing to tip. An example of this limitation can be demonstrated in dicing an onion — a Western knife generally slices downward and then rocks the tip forward to complete a cut; whereas the ''santoku'' relies more on a single downward cut and even landing from heel to tip, thus using less of a rocking motion than Western style cutlery.

The ''santoku'' design is shorter, thinner, and so lighter, with more hardened steel in the tradition of Samurai sword steel (to compensate for thinness) than a traditional European chef's knife. Standard ''santoku'' blade length is between , in comparison to the typical European cook's knife. Most classic kitchen knives maintain a blade angle between 40 and 45 degrees (a bilateral 20 to 22½ degree shoulder, from cutting edge).

Japanese knives typically incorporate a ''kataba'' chisel-edge (sharpened on one side), and maintain a more extreme angle (10 to 15 degree shoulder). A classic ''santoku'', rather, incorporates the European-style, bilateral cutting edge, but maintain a more extreme 12 to 15 degree shoulder, akin to Japanese cutlery. It is critical to increase the hardness of ''santoku'' steel so edge retention is maintained and 'rolling' of the thin cutting edge is mitigated. However, harder, thinner steel is more likely to chip, when pushing against a bone for example. German knives use slightly 'softer' steel, but have more material behind their cutting edge. For the average user, a German-style knife is easier to sharpen, but a ''santoku'' knife, if used as designed, will hold its edge longer. With few exceptions, ''santoku'' knives typically have no bolster, sometimes incorporate 'fluted' sides, also known as a Granton edge, and maintain a more uniform thickness from spine to blade edge.

Variations

Some of the knives employ '' san mai'' (or 'three layered') laminated steels, including the pattern known as . The term refers to the similarity of the pattern formed by the blade's damascened and multi-layer steel alloys to the traditional Japanese art of ''suminagashi'' marbled paper. Forged laminated stainless steel cladding is employed on higher quality Japanese ''santoku'' knives to improve strength and rust resistance while maintaining a hard edge. Knives possessing these laminated blades are generally much more expensive to match the higher quality.

There are many copies of ''santoku''-pattern knives made outside Japan that have substantially different edge designs, different balance, and different steels from the original Japanese ''santoku''. One trend in ''santoku'' copies made of a single alloy is to include fluting or recesses, hollowed out of the side of the blade, similar to those found in meat-carving knives. This fluting creates small air pockets between the blade and the material being sliced in an attempt to improve separation and reduce cutting friction.

See also

* Japanese kitchen knives
** Chef's knife — gyūtō bōchō
** Deba bōchō
** Nakiri bōchō
** Sashimi bōchō
** Usuba bōchō
* Cimeter
* Kitchen knife indentation
* List of Japanese cooking utensils

References

External links

*
Equipment Corner: Do You Really Need a Santoku Knife?
. Episode
Bistro Classics
" ''America's Test Kitchen'' TV show. 2005 Season. Viewed April 3, 2005.
How to Use the Shun Hiro Santoku Knife - Chris Cosentino by Williams-Sonoma 4:23French Chef Knife vs Santoku
- YouTube
*

{{Japanese food and drink

Japanese kitchen knives