Ceramic

mendezj

mendezj

Joined
Nov 24, 1998
Messages
993
My daughter has in her kitchen a few Kyocera ceramic knives. What sharp knives...!!! Amazing. So incredibly sharp and smooth. Extraordinary. And they seem to stay sharp forever. One of her knives is ten years old and cuts like a razor. And they are cheap. I know they are brittle but she’s never had one break. It’s a pleasure to cut onions, tomatoes, anything with them. I’d appreciate your views on ceramic knives. Thank you.
 
They fulfill an awesome niche in the kitchen. The high hardness gives it kickass edge retention. Just don’t use it on non-boneless meat lol. Take care of it and it’ll take care of you.
 
They are great fir cutting, but beef and pork bones will chip them badly. They cannot be pried with. I’ve never done it, but I understand they can be resharpened. I’d imagine it’d be a real chore, though.
 
I did own ceramic kitchen knife in the past, but the only drawback I could see is how easy it could chip. Most metallic knife may have a chance to roll or dent before chipping, but ceramic don't roll or bent. Since then I had threw them all away, after not able to recover the chipped pieces from the knife. YMMV.
 
mendezj said:
I know they are brittle but she’s never had one break.
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I have 4 such chinese marvels since some 10+ years, nice kitchen addition.
My wife broke tips in three of them already :^D
Not so sharp with constant use, some diamond touch required time to time.
 
No thanks. I don't mind touching up a kitchen knife before use. I'm a knife nut so I like steel :D
 
From what I understand, sharpening them is possible, but it seems only possible with a felt wheel with diamond compound. check out outdoors55 on youtube. he tried everything he could think of and the only thing that worked was diamond compound.

still, they are cheap, and if damaged easily replaced. personally, ill stick to steel because I can sharpen it!
 
I've historically avoided them without the tools necessary to sharpen them at home. However, I recently purchased the Diamond Matrix stones for my EdgePro, which can easily sharpen the highest hardness steels and ceramics unlike the AlOx stones I had before. I am planning to purchase several ceramic blades to start playing around with them.
 
I was just surprised at how sharp and how long those knives hold an edge. And how smoothly they cut. I mostly use knives on the outdoors so a ceramic knife would not be practical to carry. Thank you for your responses.
 
I had always been curious about them, and my local store had some in the clearance section. I decided why not, and got a Santoku-style one for about five bucks. It's on the smaller side, but it's the right size for my wife. So far I've only cut a tomato with it, and it did a great job, but I wouldn't say it's any better than my regular kitchen knives can do, especially after I've sharpened them.
 
I use Slice and 'Benchmark' (not Benchmade) ceramic utility blades, amongst others in boxcutters and they're great for everything you use a regular Stanley blade for. Where a Stanley would last me a day or two, or sometimes just a few minutes, these things go for weeks. They're a little hit and miss from time to time, but they're a better bang for the buck and have pretty impressive performance. The tip invariably chips off if you're not cutting on a mat or board, the Slice ones have rounded tips to get around this, but you get used to how to get the best from them.

CeramicUtilityBladePointedTipc.jpg
 
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I had a brief affair with ceramic knives. Even bought my mom one for Christmas one year. After speaking to several chefs, none were fans. Most even were adamantly opposed. I bought a $5 ceramic folder one late night, and it's about what you'd expect. Great for not using a nice knife to open packages. I'm sure ceramic knives have their place... I just haven't found it. I don't anticipate any future ceramic knife purchases.
 
I stay clear of ceramic.
I had a set my wife purchased for the kitchen. They chip often and are very difficult to sharpen.
I ended up throwing them all away and getting steel for the kitchen.

My favorite is the thai pig knife (grin).
 
Very niche product. They're best for someone who can be trusted to take care of their knives, but doesn't want or need the ability to sharpen it. Other than being very light compared to steel, which could be useful for either long periods of use or someone with limited arm/hand strength, and being non-oxidative (won't interact with food like metal will), there's not really enough benefit to outweigh the negatives.
 
The chipping is a HUGE issue with ceramic kitchen knives.
If you got a sec, I got a story that relates.

I work in a professional kitchen (worked actually, thanks covid!) and one day we had a company floating chef come in to help with a big catering event. He brought in his own knives and proceeded to cut a whole slew of raw veggies for a bunch of crudite platters (carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, peppers, celery, etc.). When he finished the head chef and I came over to help plate all the veggies.
When we were nearly done I noticed the white bladed knife and asked the guy if it was ceramic.
He proudly replied "Yeah, I love it. It never needs to be sharpened."
I pick it up, look close at the edge and ask him "don't these things chip?"
"only when you cut something really dense or with bones"
"Like say, a bunch of large carrots? This has a bunch of nicks along the edge." I said.
silence..
Without saying a word, the head chef walks over, gently removes the knife from my hand, and inspects the edge. Next he uses his arm to sweep everything off the table into the trash basket and all over the floor. He then walks away. About 5 minutes later he comes back with a cart full of uncut veggies, kicks the trash barrel out of the way , making more of a mess, grabs a new cutting board and a regular kitchen knife and drops them in front of the other chef.
Finally he speaks and says to me "go take your break". He looks at the guy and gestures to the cart, "Service starts in less than an hour" and walks away.

So yeah, I avoid ceramic like the plague.
 
NorthernSouthpaw said:
The chipping is a HUGE issue with ceramic kitchen knives.
If you got a sec, I got a story that relates.

I work in a professional kitchen (worked actually, thanks covid!) and one day we had a company floating chef come in to help with a big catering event. He brought in his own knives and proceeded to cut a whole slew of raw veggies for a bunch of crudite platters (carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, peppers, celery, etc.). When he finished the head chef and I came over to help plate all the veggies.
When we were nearly done I noticed the white bladed knife and asked the guy if it was ceramic.
He proudly replied "Yeah, I love it. It never needs to be sharpened."
I pick it up, look close at the edge and ask him "don't these things chip?"
"only when you cut something really dense or with bones"
"Like say, a bunch of large carrots? This has a bunch of nicks along the edge." I said.
silence..
Without saying a word, the head chef walks over, gently removes the knife from my hand, and inspects the edge. Next he uses his arm to sweep everything off the table into the trash basket and all over the floor. He then walks away. About 5 minutes later he comes back with a cart full of uncut veggies, kicks the trash barrel out of the way , making more of a mess, grabs a new cutting board and a regular kitchen knife and drops them in front of the other chef.
Finally he speaks and says to me "go take your break". He looks at the guy and gestures to the cart, "Service starts in less than an hour" and walks away.

So yeah, I avoid ceramic like the plague.
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Wow, certainly not a knife to be used by a professional. Thank you for the anecdote. I would never trade any of my knives for a ceramic knife. As a sort of gimmick and for light use they are fun, though.
 
The only thing I have used ceramic for is utility blades to go in the Gerber EAB. I honestly don't use them much because I usually just use a knife, but I like to keep some handy in my vehicles or whatnot, and I noticed that standard utility blades had a tendency to rust in the Florida humidity. Therefore I bought a pack of ceramic utility blades to put in all of my EAB's. Other than that I haven't had much interest in ceramic.
 
I've been able to successfully resharpen ceramics free-hand, with light pressure, edge trailing strokes only, on Atoma 600, Atoma 1200, DMT 4000, and DMT 8000
 
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