[Sca-cooks] A question about knives

[Huette von Ahrens]

You are right Phlip, I don't understand metal,
knives etc.  I am still have trouble
understanding how a 180 degree temperature would
ruin a temper of high carbon steel.  But as I
have said, I don't understand metal.

I have retired the Flint knives.  I have said
so before.  They will always hold a place of
honor in my house. I am throwing out a lot of
cheap knives that have collected in this house. 
Some just are too cheap to hold an edge even 
after sharpening. 

And your suggestion of purchasing cheap knives
to avoid "aggrevation" would only avoid cleaning
aggregation.  It wouldn't avoid the "this is
so dull it wouldn't cut butter" aggrevation.

However, in looking through my lastest Chef's
Catalog, I see a lot of top brand knives that
say "dishwasher safe" or "dishwasher safe, but
handwashing is recommended".  If the dishwasher
is such a bad thing for kitchen knives, why are
the manufacturers claiming this?  I bought the
Shun knives because they said they were
"dishwasher safe" and because they were more
affordable and prettier than the Wusthoff and
Henkle and Dick knives.  They aren't cheap, but 
just somewhat less expensive.  But then the
Wusthoff and the Henkle say that theirs are
dishwasher safe also.  The Dick is the only
brand I have seen to say "Handwashing only."

And, just to clarify things, the santoku knife
is _not_ a vegetable knife, any more than a
chef knife is.  According to Kershaw Shun, the
santoku in a particular style of knife and they
offer a separate, smaller vegetable knife, which
they call a vegetable knife.

Huette

--- marilyn traber 011221 <phlip at 99main.com>
wrote:

> 
> > I have only in the last few months been
> washing
> > the old knives in the dishwasher, not because
> > I wish to ruin them but because I had noticed
> > that we had a large amount of knives sitting
> > [sometimes for days] on the counter waiting
> to
> > be hand washed.  I felt it would be better
> for
> > the knives to be washed quicker than to leave
> > them dirty for days before washing. 
> 
> It's not better- you're ruining the steel. The
> temperatures alone are enough, 
> in some dishwashers, to ruin the temper of the
> knives. The "temper" is the 
> balance of hardness and softness that leaves
> you with a knife that will hold 
> an edge for a long time- if a blade is super
> hard, it's liable to break and 
> chip, if it's super soft, it won't hold an
> edge. The difference is caused by 
> developing the chrystalline structure of the
> blades, and that is done 
> strictly with heat.
> 
> The other thing you're doing with those poor
> knives, by exposing them to 
> dishwashing soap is exposing them to an
> alkaline environment, which is eating 
> the edge. If you MUST have knives that go in
> the dishwasher, go out and get a 
> cheapy set and use them, and put the older
> knives up, only using them when 
> you know you can wash them properly.
> 
> > As for the Flint knives, I have looked at
> them
> > again and they call themselves Flint
> Vanadium.
> > Whether this is high carbon or not, I don't
> know.
> > But the dark stains are only on the chef
> knives
> > and not on the bread knife, the cutting
> knife,
> > or the paring/utility knives. And the stains
> > pre-date my putting them in the dishwasher. 
> > Interestingly enough, the chef knives are the
> 
> > only ones that rust, which makes me believe
> that
> > the carbon is wearing through the vanadium
> 
> Huette, the carbon isn't wearing through the
> vanadium- it can't, any more 
> than you can mix beef bouillion and chicken
> bouillion in a soup, and pick out 
> the beef areas from the chicken areas. What you
> have, apparently, is a set of 
> knives some of which are 1st generation
> stainless steel, and some of which 
> are (relatively) high carbon steel. It is the
> nature of carbon steel knives 
> to get stained with use- the only thing you can
> do to prevent it is to not 
> use them, or to polish them up so the stains
> vanish, and since you're 
> removing steel from them every time you polish
> them, eventually you're going 
> to have them so thin that they're useless.
> 
> Vanadium is an element that, when alloyed with
> steel, gives it certain 
> qualities of toughness that are very valuable,
> but when you alloy a steel, 
> you're just mixing the element into the steel
> itself- it's not like plating, 
> where you're just applying a layer of a second
> metal over the first metal.
> 
> If I were you, I'd value the stained knives,
> and their stains, as valuable 
> servants who are showing their wear and the
> many meals they've helped 
> prepare, and retire them unless you want to use
> them for a special meal, 
> where you can clean them properly. As for the
> others in the set, continue to 
> use them, as long as they're not being affected
> by the dishwasher- otherwise, 
> retire them as well.
> 
> And, since you don't understand good knives,
> save yourself a lot of 
> aggravation, and just buy cheapies, made of
> stainless steel. If they go bad, 
> you can throw them away without a second
> thought.
> 
> Phlip
> 
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=====
Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves for they 
shall never cease to be amused.


		
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