ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Best Overall: MAC MTH-80 Professional Series 8-inch Chef’s Knife with Dimples (available at amazon.com), Best Tough Workhorses: Wüsthof Classic 8-inch Cook’s Knife (available at amazon.com) and J.A. Mac, Wusthof and Global were my stand-out favorites for quality and performance, and if you're really serious about adopting a high-quality chef's knife, any of these three will do the trick. Henckels International Classic 8-inch Chef's Knife (available at zwilling.com), Best if You Live Near a Good Sharpener: Misono UX10 Gyutou (available at amazon.com), Best Lightweight: Global G-2 Classic 8-inch Chef’s Knife (available at amazon.com), Best Value: Mercer Culinary Renaissance 8-Inch Forged Chef's Knife (available at amazon.com). We delete comments that violate our policy, which we encourage you to read. Again, especially when it comes to handles, your mileage may vary, so this knife might be worth a try. If I could only have one knife, I would definitely choose this one. Not only is the Mac super sharp (it slides through tomatoes without any tearing whatsoever), but its blade is thinner than heavier knives like Wusthof's, which makes slicing snappier veggies like carrots feel like cutting a ripe banana with a butter knife. I loved the grippy, comfortable handle, and the feeling of power that came from this heavy, wide blade. Plus, if you find it on sale for a cool $80, like I did, then you should absolutely snap up this lightweight kitchen knife. So though this knife is very handsome, I’d opt for the Classic for both price and comfort reasons. Hayward says that he likes to relax at night with a glass of wine and a whetstone and painstakingly sharpen his hundreds of knives. However, unlike the MAC, which has just enough sturdiness to deal with a chicken and butternut squash, this knife just doesn’t have the oomph for hefty jobs. So take your time, figure out exactly what you need from your chef's knife, and make an investment. Henckels (available at amazon.com), Bob Kramer is one of the most important knife-makers in the United States—his handmade knives cost thousands and thousands of dollars and have long waitlists. I wanted to like it because, of all the heavy knives, it was the most comfortable and balanced to hold, but it didn’t perform as well as I hoped. When you buy through our links, we may get a commission. But it's a really well-designed middle child that will feel incredibly comfortable to many home cooks. If you make a purchase using the links included, we may earn commission. Its belly is also comfortably rounded, which makes the rocking motion while mincing feel natural. Henckels International Classic 8-inch Chef's Knife (available at zwilling.com), These are the indestructible German blades that Hayward would take to a desert island. It supremes an orange quickly and precisely. (As with all the knives, I tested with a brand new version to keep all the variables consistent.) Missed an installment? I just couldn’t get over how the light, plastic handle felt—it’s not that it was uncomfortable, it’s more that it made my grip feel less confident. Speaking very generally, harder steel is sharper and more delicate, while softer steel is tougher. All Rights Reserved. (Weight: 5.89 ounces. ), This was my first knife—I saved for it for months when I was in my early 20s, so I have a soft spot for it. Food & Wine is part of the Meredith Corporation Allrecipes Food Group. ), Shun Sora 8-inch Chef’s Knife (available at amazon.com), This is a scalpel-sharp knife with a very thin, nimble, extremely hard blade (about 61 on the Rockwell Hardness Scale) with a long, tapered tip. It also requires professional sharpening: One of the secrets to this knife’s amazingness is the fact that it is honed to an asymmetrical edge—one side is 70 degrees and one is 30 degrees, so you have to buy a left-handed or a right-handed model. Hands-down, the biggest surprise of my testing was the performance of Mercer's $16 Culinary Millennia 8-inch chef's knife. It was one of the best of all the knives at cutting up chicken—giving Wüsthof a run for its money—but was also surprisingly adept at slicing tomatoes, supreming oranges, and dicing onion. RELATED: The Best Knife Deals for Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2020. F&W tested 14 popular chef’s knives to find the very best. While I gave my assessments above, everyone will have their own slight preferences -- Global feels best to me, but if I ate more meat and denser veggies, I would probably lean toward Wusthof as the more robust blade. ), Victorinox 8-Inch Fibrox Pro Chef's Knife (available at amazon.com), This knife tops many lists as a great value, but I found it to be the worst of the two worlds: light but not very sharp, cumbersome and large. Dicing an onion, it felt balky and a little dull, almost hard to control. Artisan Revere's main problem? There is no such thing as the best chef’s knife—finding the knife that works best for you involves considering many variables, like the size of your hands, the style of your cooking and what feels natural and comfortable to you. The high carbon stainless steel makes it quite hard, but also has a dose of molybdenum, which lessens brittleness and makes the metal more flexible, less likely to chip. ), This is a terrific knife for the price. 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