Review: Glestain Gyuto (Chef's knife)

Cooking Discussions Cookware
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I just bought a Glestain 210mm Gyuto from Korin for ~$155 (tax included). First time being at Korin – and almost didn’t buy this great knife.

Bottomline: knife performance is great, and foods barely stick to the blade making it very easy to prep food. It is one of the few knives which has given me that revelation/epiphany feeling.

As some of you may know, the Glestain knives are known for that pronounced indentation which minimizes food sticking to the blade. Here is one video:

I don’t have a video, but I have a few photos to share.

Photo 1 and 2: Side-by-side comparison between a Glestain and a Tojiro DP gyuto. (Glestain on the bottom)

Photo 3: Center of mass/balance point is at the end of the blade (heel), before the bloster.

Photo 4: Cross view of the blade. The blade grind is asymmetric. The side with the indentation facing outward (aka front) is significantly curved. The side without indentation is much straighter

Photo 5: Push cutting results between the Glestain and the Tojiro DP. When using Tojiro DP, the onion stuck to the blade. When using the Glestain, the blade remained clean, and the diced onion bits stayed behind on the cutting board.

Photo 6: Push cutting a halved tomato with the Glestain. Vast majority of diced tomato pieces stayed together on the cutting board – instead of carried off by the knife blade, except that one piece you see stuck to the back side of the blade.

Based on my last night experience, the Glestain blade truly minimizes food sticking to the blade and therefore it was much faster to prep foods using it. Food stayed together, so it was easily to keep on dicing them finer and finer. I also didn’t have to constantly remove food on the blade.

Specific geometry comparison between the Tojiro DP and Glestain:

Blade length:
Tojiro DP: 210 mm, Glestain: 210 mm

Weight
Tojiro DP: 195 g, Glestain: 185 g

Blade thickness at spine near heel area:
Tojiro DP: 1.8 mm, Glestain: 2.8 mm

Blade thickness at the middle area between the spine and the blade:
Tojiro DP: 1.4 mm, Glestain: 1.8 mm

Blade thickness 2 mm from the edge:
Tojiro DP: 0.9 mm, Glestain: 1.0 mm

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Thanks for the review! I was also at Korin recently and looked at the Glestein, but couldn’t make the decision. Are you planning to sharpen this yourself, or sending it to a pro? The asymmetric grind is one thing I’m worried about not being able to sharpen/hone well at home.

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Thank for your reply. I plan to sharpen it myself. The edge grind (the edge bevel angle) is 80/20. It won’t matter much if I intentionally or unintentionally alter it a little, say to 70/30. Do you plan to alter the bevel angle? In term of the overall blade surface grind (photo 4), that is not something we can alter anyway.

I suppose if you live near Korin, then you can get your knife resharpen there. There are a few reputable knife sharpeners which can be reached through mail. I would actually trust an average professional knife sharpner than you and me to sharpen an asymmetric bevel.

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Hey! I bought a Glestain gyuto, I think it was from Korin, many years ago. It is wonderful, and things don’t stick to it, but I bought the 270mm version. It weighs 330 grams. This means, it is tiring to work with if I am doing a lot of cutting. That is why I am interested in good, lighter knives for quick cooking jobs.

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270 mm? I thought about getting a 240 mm, but at the end went with the 210 mm. I was also presented two choices. The lighter and slightly cheaper regular model and the heavier and slightly more expensive professional model. At the end, the lighter weight just seems more attractive to me.

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Did you get the heavier model?

Year ago, only Glestain makes these wide indentation knives. Now, I see several other brands with very similar look. Togiharu also offer the wide indentation blade knives:

Korin’s pricing is actually very good. Their in-store prices do not look inflated compared to even some of the better online stores.

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Really nice review, CK. Great pictures too!

Glad to hear that you like your new Glestain knife. I definitely agree with your use of the word “epiphany”. That’s exactly how I felt the first time I used my Glestain santoku to slice up an eggplant. Each slice just fell right off the blade. Truly a religious experience.

TS

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Thanks for your feedback. So what else do you like about your Glestain santoku and what else do you dislike about the knife? Yeah, I was really amazed that none of the food sticks the to blade.

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Good review, Chem. And good buy.

I have a couple slicers with these hollows, except they’re on both sides. They do keep food from sticking–better. Have you tried slicing something truly sticky, like cheese?

I notice that this blade is thicker throughout than your Tojiro. Putting the hollows in a very thin Blade would be iffy. How do you think this new knife would compare in slicing vegetables with an ultrathin “laser”?

Aloha,
Kaleo

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Thanks for your insightful reply.

I luck out. I almost walked out of the Korin before I made one last attempt on what to buy. The nonstick ability is much better than I thought. I haven’t tried cheese yet. I have some really nice hard sheep cheese. I can give them a try. I doubt the knife will work for soft cheese like brie.

Yeah, the blade is definitely thicker than the Tojiro. I think a large part of it is exactly what you said – to put a good size hollow. The other possible reason is to produce a pronounced convex blade grind.

I don’t have an ultrathin laser gyuto, but I do have a very thin blade CCK which is known to be as thin if not thinner than most ultra laser.

I haven’t tried to test them side by side, but I know foods do stick to the CCK blade. However, I would think the CCK has lesser cutting resistance than this Glestain (which isn’t thin at all). I will have to test to be sure.

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If I knew then, what I know now …
I bought it years ago off the website without ever having handled it. It’s still my first choice for slicing anything really sticky, like potatoes.

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What is your current “go-to” knife for most things?

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I do a lot of chopping of parsley, coriander, and the like, so I usually reach for my Victorinox. That way I don’t have to worry about chipping.

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Would you say this knife will replace the Tojiro DP for you?

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Yeah, if the trend continues, this Glestain gyuto should replace my Tojiro DP.

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Just got my 210mm Glestein Santouku yesterday. Out of the box the knife cuts beautifully and the dimples really do work - completely nonstick for potatoes. Certainly much less sticky than my other dimpled knife that I am used to. Here’s a picture of my MAC dimpled Santouku:
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/21bsT3ESpFL.SX425.jpg

In person I was also surprised that the Glestein dimples are much shallower compared to the MAC. The wideness was certainly expected from all the pictures. Next will be learning to sharpen the asymmetrical blade!

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Yeah. I have used many other dimples knives, but most of them do not work. Glestain really works. The first I used it, it really felt a little magical. Yes, I have seen it in action in video, but it is a totally different feeling to see it in action while using it. Yes, the dimples in Glestain are shallow, but they are very large in comparison. I have recently sharpen the edge. It is not too bad. I try not to go crazy in the sharpening because we really don’t want to sharpen all the way to the hallow area and make the knife useless.

Glad you like your Glestian knife too.

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One short video comparing Glestain with JA Henckels (2 min). Although this one is shorter, the camera angle is closer and illustrates the easy of working with a Glestain knife

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Impressive. Quite a bit of fusion going on there! :slight_smile:

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“The Fusion is what gives the Jedi his power. It`s an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us. It penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together.”

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Zwilling Slicer
Zwilling Slicer2576×1932 311 KB

Hi, Chem:

I want to challenge the idea that sharpening down to the hollows ruins a knife. Here is a close-up photo of a c1960’s Twin Works (Zwilling) 14" slicer. I acquired this knife maybe 20 years ago from a collector who had a yard sale including an entire box of there ebony-handled knives. My regret is not buying every single one! They were all in NIB condition.

As you can see, the hollows extend well into the cutting edge. This was the original condition of the blade, and the handful of sharpenings I’ve given it over the years hasn’t caused the edge to noticeably recede further into the hollows.

It sharpens and cuts as Zwilling intended. On a flat platen or stone, there really isn’t any contact with the hollowed areas, although a closer look shows a continuous straight cutting edge. So there are no dips in the edge caused bu the hollows. Rather there is a thinner edge within the hollows.

The hollows on this, Glestain, J-knives’ hammering finish, , the “other” English company’s, even the concave face variants all serve the same purpose–reducing food contact and hence increasing release and decreasing drag. Some work better than others at this, irrespective of whether there is anything resembling a serration.

I’s interesting to note that even Glestain sells a serrated slicer. See, https://www.knifemerchant.com/product.asp?productID=13277&gclid=Cj0KCQjw8uOWBhDXARIsAOxKJ2EMbYUaNUSLIcyHYnods9cJOqoLm9ILQE9qLLi1mH3vLJAeCCuLUI0aAu3cEALw_wcB

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