Types of Steel Used for Kitchen Knives: Part 1

Video Transcript

"My name is Brandon Sarkis on behalf of Expert Village. Today I'd like to speak with you about what to look for when buying kitchen knives. This next segment is all about blade materials and steels. The first knife you're going to see here, this is going to be a stamp steel blade. And what that typically means is it's going to be your cheapest blade, it's going to be your thinnest blade and it's going to be your blade that is the least expensive. Nothing wrong with that if that's what you're looking for but this blade's not going to last you forever. This blade also has a the a the ever sharp edge on it here which is a good way of kind of faking it through keeping your knife sharp forever. The advantage these blades is that they're relatively inexpensive, they're easy to replace. Disadvantage being is that the steel is highly unreliable. You could get this thing hot and it could lose all of its temper or you could tap it on the counter to many times, loose all of its temper. It's just it's not best steel for cooking on a day to day basis but like I said it's plentiful and it's very, very inexpensive. Next steel I'll show you is a high carbon stainless. Typically found in your a European blades. This is actually a German knife. The advantage to high carbon stainless is that it's a softer steel and so what can happen is it's very easy to sharpen it. The problem is though is that unlike other steels that are harder is that since it's very easy to sharpen, it's also very easy to dull it down. This knife is easy to keep an edge on like perpetually by going over the honing steel or drawing through the sharpener once every couple of months. Problem is though is that you'll spend more time sharpening this than you will other knives. And also these knives are more susceptible to, as you can see here at the bottom, nicking and dulling on the tip just because of what eventually happens the metal just wears down. These are really soft, they're great knives but ultimately you have to determine if that's what's going to work for you. You know a softer steel that you can sharper easier or a harder steel that's harder to sharpen but lasts longer. "