So you want to buy a kitchen knife or more likely kitchen knives. Once you start to scratch the surface all of these odd words start creeping into the conversation, bolsters, heel, tang, and why exactly are they talking about butts! All of these words apply to pretty well every knife you will purchase. With a little understanding of the anatomy of a kitchen knife you will be better prepared when getting out there and buying kitchen knives.

If the word “Blade” perplexes you it is definitely not time to pick that knife up just yet. The Blade of course is the working end of any knife, yes it is the part of the knife that does the cutting. I know, I know it seems obvious what the blade is but this is an article about knife anatomy and the blade is a pretty important part. Dissecting the blade anatomy we have:

1. The Tip – the very end of the blade opposite the handle and usually a very sharp point. As said the tip is usually very pointed but some knives will have a rounded tip or even blunted. The tip is often the thinnest part of the blade used for things like cutting thin strips, or making incisions.

2. Cutting Edge – is the true working part of the knife. It is the sharpened part of the blade and runs from the tip to where the handle meets the blade. It is most often a smooth cutting edge but can be serrated as well. We just don’t have the space to get into the different types of edge grinds here but will spend time in another article just on grinds and what to consider when buying kitchen knives.

3. Heel – is the last couple of inches of the cutting edge where it meets the handle. The heel is usually the thickest part of the blade and is used when some pressure needs to be applied to what you are cutting. It is the section used when you see someone quickly slicing food such as onions, those show offs!

4. Spine – is the back of the blade. It is the thick “backbone” opposite the cutting edge. Generally the thicker the spine the heavier the knife. It is not sharp allowing the user to put a thumb or palm on the spine to add more pressure.

5. Ricasso – Not always found on all kitchen knives but when they are you will notice them by it being the flat area where the heel meets the handle. It would show the grind lines of the blade.

Getting all of the dangerous parts out of the way we can now move onto the handle of the knife:

1. Bolster – not all knives have bolsters but if they do they are usually metal and are the starting point of the handle. Some knives will have bolsters that are integral to the blade meaning that the blade will “swell” out when it meets the handle. This section adds weight and often helps with balancing a knife. Many people say that a perfectly balanced knife will balance on one finger at the bolster. Whether this is your preference or not will only be determined from handling many knives.

2. Guard – Whether the kitchen knife has bolsters or not there is typically an area called the guard or finger guard. This is the part of the handle where it meets the heel of the knife. If there are bolsters these will make the guard, if not the steel of the knife will make the guard. It serves to protect your fingers from the cutting edge.

3. Tang – This is the part of the knife that runs through the handle. Your kitchen knife can be a hidden tang (no steel shown in the handle), a partial tang (some length of steel in the handle but not all the way around), or full tang (steel running through the entire handle. A hidden tang makes for the lightest knife but weakest handle where as a full tang makes for the heaviest but strongest handled knife.

4. Handle – The section where you can safely hold the knife. It is the part that surrounds the tang, usually made from wood or synthetic materials. Of all the parts of a knife this one varies the most in terms of people’s preferences. You really have to try out several knives to find the handle fit that works best for you.

5. Rivets – These are the bolts that go through the handle and tang in order to attach the handle scales to the knife. For comforts sake the rivets are usually ground smooth to the handle in order to avoid irritation.

6. Butt – Yes finally we get to the Butt. It is go figure the end of the handle. The part of the knife furthest from the tip. Some people use the Butt for pounding but this is not recommended as it can damage the handle.

There you have it, that is the majority of terms used to describe the anatomy of every knife. This is of course not the end of it all when it comes to odd words used when discussing kitchen knives but understanding these terms will give you a good start in your search for buying kitchen knives.

Once a gouge has been correctly sharpened, it doesn’t take much afterwards to bring the edge back to absolute sharpness. This refers to the natural wearing away of the edge from use and not as a result of it being damaged. When all it needs is some honing, a bringing back to razor-sharpness, and not a true sharpening, there’s something very handy that you can do about that.

One way to bring your edge back to pristine condition is to make a gouge honing board. Instead of using a fine grade sharpening stone all of the time, you could use your very handy honing board to bring back an edge. These are the things you’ll need:

Solid rectangular block of softwood, 3″ x 2″ x 1″ (l x w x h)

Rouging compound, fine abrasive powder or paste

Bench knife, fixed blade of less than 5″ long

Tool with a non-sharpened edge/an old knife

The block of wood doesn’t have to be of the specified dimensions, just close enough. If you want better control, it could easily be longer or wider. The honing section that you’ll create can be placed anywhere on the block that suits you best. After all, that’s what making this honing board is all about: your comfort and ease in honing gouges.

There are many types of rouging compounds. What you want is a material that can coat a surface with an easy application, especially in troughs and tight corners. You definitely don’t want a rouging or polishing compound that comes in the form of a solid block. That would be nearly useless in this application.

A bench knife is preferred because of the small fixed blade. You don’t need much of a cutting edge to make the honing board. You just need something sturdy and sharp. Be sure this knife has been sharpened before you begin.

Here we go. Take the wood block and decide where you’d like to create the honing section. If you follow the given dimensions, just start about a half inch inwards from the width-wise side. Take the gouge to be honed and cut a concave or positive profile into the wood. Using the exact dimensions of the gouge as your guide, be careful not to widen the trough further than the gouge is wide.

Now you’ll cut the convex or negative profile into the wood. Take the same gouge used to make the positive profile. Move further inwards along the block of wood by about a quarter of an inch. That would be a quarter of an inch inwards from the positive profile. Take the gouge and turn it over so that the trough is upside down. In this position, cut the negative profile of the gouge into the wood. Take care not to widen the convex curve further than the gouge is wide.

You have just made a gouge honing board. Well done. Use the bench knife to square the edges between the carved profiles. It wouldn’t be difficult for you to create a special honing board with positive and negative profiles for each of your regularly used gouges.

Now you’ll prepare it for honing. Take the rouging compound and, using an old knife or a tool with a non-sharpened edge, evenly lay the compound all along the trough of the positive profile. When you’re done, apply the rouging compound evenly over the convex surface of the negative profile. Take the overturned gouge to softly pack compound into the tight corners of the negative profile. And now your gouge honing board is ready.

When it’s time to use it, just follow the bevel of the gouge. For the positive profile, lay your gouge in the trough, which should fit nice and tightly with the rouging compound added, and pull your gouge through the trough with the outside bevel flush on the honing board. For the negative profile, turn your gouge over and fit it over the convex surface and into the tight corners. With the inside bevel flush on the wood, pull it smoothly through the profile. Apply more rouging compound when necessary. Only use moderate pressure when pulling your gouges over the honing board.

There you go. You have successfully made yourself a gouge honing board. And you know how to use it correctly. Just remember, it isn’t actual sharpening but it will get an already sharpened, undamaged edge back to good working condition. It’s very simple, yet very effective. Just imagine what other types of quick-fixes could be made for carving tools.

About a year and a half ago, I told my husband that it was time I got myself a nice, high quality “chef’s knife”. At that time, all I had in my kitchen, knifewise, was a fairly crappy knife set we received as a wedding present a few years before. I had started cooking on an almost daily basis, which of course required a lot of chopping, mincing, dicing, slicing and all that. Needless to say, my “low caliber” kitchen knives were just not “cutting it”, no pun intended; which brings me back to my telling my husband that I needed a nicer set of knives or at least one good, top-quality all-purpose knife. Being an all things gourmet connoisseur, he told me in that I should make sure I chose a kullenschliff knife. “Kullensch-what? I said. It sounded like something Alton Brown would say.

Needless to say, I had no idea what a kullenschliff knife was but I was determined to find out, on my own. There isn’t much out there regarding the history of kullenschliff knives but I found enough information to at least know what it means and what their purpose is. Here is what I’ve gathered so far:

1. Kullenschliff is not the type of knife but rather a specific design of the blade. It is a series of alternating oval scallops ground into both sides of the blade. These tiny grooves reduce drag on the knife, resulting in a paper-thin and incredibly smooth cut. The tiny grooves also allow food to slide off the knife without sticking.
2. kullenschliff (kulle is Swedish for hill; schliff means sharpened in German oval scallops (kullar) .
3. Sometimes referred to as Granton edges which have semi-circular scallops ground into the edge that alternate on either side of the knife and extend from the edge to the middle of the blade. This edge was designed and patented in 1928 by Granton Ragg Ltd.
4. Pretty much any high quality knife maker out there has Kullenschliff knives.
5. Make sure the grooves come right down to the cutting edge- Apparently if they run along the middle of the blade, they are not doing their thing.

Armed with my newly acquired knowledge about kullenschliff knives, I set out to find the best one for me. During my search, I also learned a lot about chef’s knives in general, and the Santoku knife in particular-but that’s another story. Anyway, since I was looking for a good, all-purpose, sort of do-it-all chef’s knife, I came to the conclusion that what I needed was a top-notch Kullenschliff chef’s knife. I purchased one from my favorite online kitchen supplies store and what a difference! I was so happy with my chef’s knife that my husband decided to buy me 10″ Kullenschliff roast knife at Thanksgiving time. It works great! I’m so delighted with the ease of use and the…well the awesomeness of having knives that chop, dice, slice and carve as smoothly and as beautifully as they look. I no longer hesitate to invest in durable, high quality cooking tools as they make my cooking experience even more enjoyable.

Often knife sharpeners for sharpening knives and knife honing for maintaining knives are misunderstood. Honing a knife is not the same as sharpening a knife. The sharp edge is still there it has just simply started to roll away from the true cutting edge of the blade. For example, you can hone a knife but that only results in straightening the sharp blade edge called the bevel. Bevels typically have a “V” shape to them. Honing a knife restores the nice “V” shape or bevel to knife blade edge. A honing rod ¼ to ½ inch thick made of steel, ceramic or diamond and about 1 foot long or longer is typically used to hone a knife.

On the other hand sharpening a knife restores the beveled edge back to the correct angle specifications for the cutting utensil. So it is possible to sharpen a knife yet provide some honing characteristics in the process of sharpening as knife sharpening also helps to straighten the edge. Some two-stage manual knife sharpeners provide the ability to sharpen the knife, hone the knife or both. A two-stage sharpener is very convenient because having the ability to hone a knife blade means that the knife will not require sharpening as often.

What determines the angle is what you will use the knife for. The larger the bevels angle the more durable it will be and the longer the knife blade will last between sharpening. The shallower the bevels angle the sharper and more delicate it will be but the knife blade will require sharpening more often. There are many suitable angles for a beveled knife edge to have but not all are suitable for basic kitchen cutlery.

For example, an 11-degree bevel angle is the narrowest and is used to put a razor-sharp edge on fine-cutting tools like X-Acto blades, woodcarving instruments and other specialty tools. This angle will require the most frequent re-sharpening. Usually X-Acto blades are so economically priced you can easily dispose of them and replace the blade when it gets dull. Then there is the 15-degree bevel angle and it is most suitable for fillet, boning and uses that require exceptional sharpness and a bit more durability.

For kitchen cutlery the 19-degree bevel angle is recommended. When selecting a knife sharpener it is important to choose one that will restore the kitchen knife to the correct angle. It is also important to have a knife sharpener that is convenient to use so you feel like sharpening your knives often so that you spend less time on cutting tasks and your knives cut better. It is not important for a kitchen knife sharpener to provide a super polished edge. A super polished edge does not slice and dice best for food processing duties required by the chef.

Lastly, there is the 22-degree bevel angle that provides a wider, more durable edge suitable for pocket knives, fixed-blade hunting knives and serrated-blade knives. The 25-degree bevel angle is the widest, producing the longest lasting edge for utility knives, like carpet, linoleum and electricians knives.