Chef's Knife Pinch Grip

R

Ryan Shea

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Jan 27, 2019
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So, most chef's out there prefer the pinch grip method of holding a Chef's knife. Are there any of you out there who have made a chef's knife with this in mind, maybe where the handle extends into the blade? Is there a reason these knives are still made as if people are holding the knife with the full handle in the user's hand? Thoughts?
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The whole point of the pinch grip is to pinch the blade just in front of the handle. You don't want to move the handle forward, or the grip would not work comfortably.

I use #2 grip most of the time, as it seems most comfortable to me with lighter knives.
 
What Stacy said.
The pinch grip gives you a lot of lateral control because you can make (and feel) fine adjustments with your fingers instead of moving your whole wrist, it's not a compensation for an inadequate handle design.
I switch around my grip depending on what I'm doing. A handle should be versatile, rather than targeted for a single grip style.
 
I seem to be, recently, pinching and holding the knife with my thumb and middle finger and my index finger just a hair ahead on the spine.. sounds awkward but gives me good control and feel.
 
I like to make a handle comfortable in all grips, because as I maker, I don't know how the end user is going to hold the knife. That said, there is a technique or design element that I use to help the transition between ricasso and handle... I call them ramps, but it's just a bevel or facet placed in the front of the scale to make the transition more smooth. Here is an example on my last Santoku... This one has a flat ramp on it... I also do a 'hollow' ground ramps on my edc/user knifes


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Chefs knives were made with pinch grip in mind. The full height bolsters served as a place to rest the index finger and control from. Those have fallen out of fashion a bit I think some due to sharpening and some due to appearance influences of Japanese cutlery which are used differently.
 
If anything, the trend is the opposite - to have an exposed neck/emoto, matching the height of the handle. This can be pinched just ahead of the handle.

That said, integrals with blended half-height bolsters are popular, too.
 
Umm ... i am going to be on the outside of this: i use “grip#3” .. but even in a more extreme manner. Blade is held between thumb and index finger(first finger), and the handle rests (is NOT gripped) against the palm. Control is thus only supplied by the thumb and single finger. The handle then supplies counterweight (ie balance) against the weight of the blade. In my mind the ideal is if the center of gravity of the blade is at that point just ahead of the handle (or bolster). One reason for using brass (a pommel) at the end of the handle. I have previously said i am interested in knife design... this is one of those aspects of interest... of course the handle also serves an esthetic/artistic aspect also!

Of course this is just my opinion (imho)... so take it as you will .. but it comes from a lifetime of cooking and playing with many different knife styles (dont get me going on the philosophical differences between western and japanese knives )
 
I make all my knives with this in mind. It’s the number one reason you should always taper the front of the scales, round the spine, and round the choil.
 
For very light chopping, like mincing garlic, you can quickly bring the blade up and down using just your index finger with grip #2. Also I find that you can rock chop one handed very comfortably with a minimum of arm motion with #2.

Some chef's knives, especially ones with very wide blades, are very uncomfortable with grip #2 because your index finger has to go so high. I put a depression right there in mine so your finger is at a more comfortable angle. I also round off the front of the scales so that your index finger can curl around the front of the scale in grip #3. You can either put your thumb up in the depression, do a standard pinch grip, or do a pinch grip with your thumb gripping the handle instead of the blade. I design my chef's knives so that a wide variety of grips can be used comfortably. Some grips are possible that would be very awkward with a standard chef's knife.
 
DrHenley said:
For very light chopping, like mincing garlic, you can quickly bring the blade up and down using just your index finger with grip #2. Also I find that you can rock chop one handed very comfortably with a minimum of arm motion with #2.

Some chef's knives, especially ones with very wide blades, are very uncomfortable with grip #2 because your index finger has to go so high. I put a depression right there in mine so your finger is at a more comfortable angle. I also round off the front of the scales so that your index finger can curl around the front of the scale in grip #3. You can either put your thumb up in the depression, do a standard pinch grip, or do a pinch grip with your thumb gripping the handle instead of the blade. I design my chef's knives so that a wide variety of grips can be used comfortably. Some grips are possible that would be very awkward with a standard chef's knife.
Click to expand...
Sounds interesting do you have pics? Maybe I'm dense tonight but I can't picture it.

I'm still trying to come up with the perfect grip for my chef knives.
 
I am a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America and I was a chef for several years. Nearly all the chefs I worked with and I used the pinch grip. However, it seems that most manufacturers do not take this into consideration when designing their knives. Almost every chef I have known has a callus on their index finger where the sharp corner of the bolster and the beginning of the spine rubs when the knife pivots during cutting. Try cutting 20 lbs of carrots into small dice using a pinch grip and you will learn a painful lesson about knife design. Unless you are a seasoned (no pun intended) chef, I will put money on it that you will get a blister on your index finger from those sharp corners. Rounding these surfaces would help, but wouldn't do much for aesthetics.
 
I think there are many examples out there where manufacturers of high-end commercial knives have design aspects that are ... well, really bad (from a functional/maintenance/sharpening perspective). I even have a knife (expensive!) from a well-known custom blade maker that went commercial that i barely use because of what i view as a couple design flaws that make it too frustrating to use (looks cool though!) Just makes opportunity for the folks here to get it right!
 
Storm W said:
Sounds interesting do you have pics? Maybe I'm dense tonight but I can't picture it.

I'm still trying to come up with the perfect grip for my chef knives.
Click to expand...
Here is what I'm talking about. And before anyone asks, my knives are not for sale. I'm retired and doing this as a hobby and only making knives for friends and family. I got interested in chef's knife design after making tabouleh a few times. Finely cubing tomatoes and cucumbers, finely slicing green onions, mincing garlic, and chopping parsely and mint is very demanding on a knife and I would often use two different knives because no one knife would do everything well. I tried various different type of knives (French chef's, German chef's, nakiri, santoku, usuba etc.) and the one that was most comfortable to use and able to do everything fairly well was the German, specifically the Wusthof Classic. But the handle itself was the biggest problem. So I duplicated the edge contour but set about trying to make it more ergonomic.

On my first attempt, I took a Chicago Cutlery chef's knife that my wife bought at Goodwill, ground off the serrations, blended the bevel and reshaped the handle and replaced the broken plastic scales. I gave it to my daughter, but I liked it so much I decided to make one for myself. Then I bought some AEB-L and started tinkering with various aspects and I am now on iteration #5.

Anyhow, here are the different positions I was talking about.
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For grip 3 a backward angled handle such as on Victorinox rosewood chefs give a secure place for the finger to stop. Seen variations of Doc Henley's dip but not many on chefs more on boning knives.
IMHO most pros use grip 3 and chefs or santokus handles should be optimized for that. Grip 2 is more for utility, boning, petty knives.
 
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