Absolutely.
And with a $35 knife, maybe less, before the inflation of the last year or so.
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In cooking schools that keep standards high (which is a reasonable expectation, given how crazy their prices are now), I doubt they train their budding cooks with junk or send them out with a wrap full of crap knives.
Hiring chef to sous chef, filling an opening: Oh no, he went to *****. That means he’ll be bringing his shitty knives into my kitchen.
Sous chef: Yeah. Plus none of our cooks have ingrained respect for knife maintenance. Let’s find some guy with HRC 62 knives from China.
This kind of infantile sensationalism maligning donkeys is another great reason to look to sources other than reddit. Mercers are nice, well regarded knives, and for someone who, like most people, does not want to drop a couple hundred on a knife, they are a pretty good choice. As to edge retention or difficulty with sharpening, I am guessing it has an element of user error. Softer steels are usually easy to sharpen, and frequent honing keeps them sharp a long time.
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Hi JustCharlie,
In the abstract, you’ve made powerful points about knife use that have merit.
Now that you’re a home cook yourself, it would be most helpful if you got more practically specific. What’s your home batterie right now, and how do you use it?
Maybe describe your home setup?
Maybe some specific examples and a few pictures?
It would be interesting to see how you follow your own admonishments for and with your family at home.
Hi Vecchiouomo,
I’m a home cook, an enthusiast, and someone who likes to explore and even evaluate technology and business models.
I have almost no interest or knowledge in the professional world of cooking. As far as I can tell, Mercer has found a a very worthwhile niche in this world–especially for startup professional–and they market primarily through restaurant supply. They clearly know their market.
Other manufacturers market to home cooks–through very different outlets–and deal with very different concerns–with a much wider range of products and prices.
Crossover is more difficult than you think. IMO, of course.
Nice video.
Yet will you do with kids who can’t read good?
Depends which way you are crossing. Everyone I know who has worked in any commercial kitchen (not sure I count McDonald’s since it so specialized and automated) can acquit themselves well in a home kitchen. Although it is contrived as heck and the coaching is edited out, a show like Master Chef shows how home cooks, even very good ones, struggle to up their games, getting flustered by the speed, forgetting to preheat pans, omitting steps or ingredients, not using the appropriate amount of seasoning, failing to hit cooking temperatures, and so on, especially unable to achieve consistency.
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I use a Dexter 8" chef’s knife, Dexter boning knife, a Wusthof utility, Dexter and no-name parers, and a Pfaltzgraff bread knife my wife bought years ago for the cabin when some other one we had got misplaced but was eventually found. Probably need to replace the bread knife.
I usually get a couple thousand dollars or so worth of knives a year as gifts which are given away, unopened. The last couple years’ worth were donated to a culinary school in Manhattan.
I don’t particularly like the Wusthof Classic handles as I believe I’ve mentioned before. If I went back to work full-time in a professional kitchen I’d most likely use a Global 8" or maybe something else in that range. Or maybe not. Dexter and certainly Mercer would work. I don’t use the Wusthof utility that much. It’s honed at a low angle, and comes in handy at times when dealing with fish.
Edge longevity isn’t a big deal for the home chef. The worst knife on the planet will get you through the kitchen prep for even a decent-sized holiday gathering, much less day in and day out meals.
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There are some truth of this, but i think it has more to do with expectations and the tasks. I was using a very dull knife for a long time. When I first shifted to a sharp good quality knife, I was constantly cutting into the cutting board ( I was so used to using a large force to cut). So obviously one can use a dull knife for many kitchen tasks, but i think once the person has experienced more refined and better knives, then they know what they are missing.
Case in point, when i was in grade school, I honest to god believe McDonald makes the best hamburgers on Earth. I can still eat a McDonald burger but now I appreciate there are better burgers.
Thanks, JustCharlie,
Completely different from me. I’m a home cook who wants to have fun–enjoy aesthetics–and do comparisons–and try out different “strokes.”
I’ve never seen any of the knives you use except the Wusthof–and I only have Classic Ikon handles.
OK - I watched it 4 times, then went into the kitchen - I had half an onion in the fridge, already pole to pole cut, got my Victorinox chef’s knife (which is kept sharp, than you for asking) and set about to conquer a new skill. Oh, and my fly-tying magnifying glasses. Seriously. What’s the first thing I learned? Why. Why that small a dice. That was the most important take-away! The second thing I realized, aside from the fact that I don’t have those kind of knife skills, of course, was that I could take my time. As much time as I wanted, because I don’t have Chef wanting to kill me, or a deadline. All I’m after is results. So … pretty small dice, not that small, but smaller than the first dice, and then I cheated and I rock chopped my mass into a finer mass. I told you it was my kitchen! But then I got some butter and a pan ad=ne I sweated the onions. I was grinning like a Cheshire Cat. Ooooh. Wow. Cool. I have sharpened my skills, not my knife. And guess what? A fancier knife would have done absolutely nothing to help me. NB: I know how to do the first dice. That’s standard operating procedure, but I swear I thought some one was saying Cajun School and not Catering School …
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While I don’t have much use for it now but I was once a fan of Dexter boning knives. That knife paired with cold meat was a workhorse and a razor.
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Burrfection is probably very informative for most but he drives me nuts such that I can’t watch him no matter how much I want to like him.
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I actually do not watch him that often, but he seems to be relatively accurate for what I have seen. How does the guy brother you?
We use fixwell Alfi knives for routine purposes around the kitchen.
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Hi alarash,
Its amazing to me how successful he’s become with no culinary credentials whatsoever: almost the antithesis of Chef Panko.
Hi Charlie,
Shows how completely different Marco’s world of knives and cooking prep is from an enthusiast home cook like me.
I play with cutting up onions many different ways with a variety of knives: exploring the possibilities. Marco seems to be almost a comical alternative. I don’t know why Marco chose a “beater” knife with a belly (or that cutting board)–or how he taught himself to hold that knife. Does he really think he knows enough to teach a culinary student or anyone else anything about prepping onions? How much does he really know about a “domestic cook” like me?
Recent knife designers for home cooks offer half bolsters that encourage a pinch grip–and allow the user to easily change that grip. They afford rock chopping or push cutting–with a significantly reduced belly profile.
Marco’s aggressive rock chopping on an onion fragment with a beater knife is hardly a best practice I’d care to emulate.
My first choice for decades of vegetable prep has been a nakiri–and it hardly has any belly at all. It screams “push cut” or “vertical chop”–not rock and roll.
For Marco’s more aggressive style, one could even go to a vertical chopping vegetable cleaver, and blast those onion pieces into tinier and tinier bits.
A petty knife would give better control–and Marco wouldn’t need to stick his index finger along the spine.
I think I’d have lots more fun than Marco exploring in my more leisurely way…
Comical? Wow.
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Hi Ray,
If we are refering to the video that Justcharlie posted then I would find it hard to have control of a knife while sitting and chopping. I have more freedom and would be more relaxed standing up.
Perhaps that would explain his grasp?
Olunia
Don’t take it personally. It’s just a discussion about knives on an online food board 
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