Nakiri?

[oldschool45]

I made something close to one but it has too thick of a spine and is a little short. The one I made is more of a baby cleaver. I know it is a vegetable knife but where does it fit in use wise between say a Santuko & a Gyuto?

The one I made is centered i this pic and my yangiba is on the far right
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=166188&d=1273674999

 

[thombrogan]

Traditionally, nakkiri are used solely for vegetables (deba and yanagiba are for fish though deba can be used for other meats, too) and the santoku and gyuto are used for anything edible.

The nakkiri also looks like the knife used for carving duck in Chinese cuisine, so if you use it on non-veggie foods, I won't tell if you won't.

 

[Knife Outlet]

The nakiri - basically a double bevel usuba - is a veggie knife as Thom says. A properly made one should be thinner in the blade than a gyuto and have little to no belly. The edge should be parallel to the handle. The gyuto will do veggie chopping better than the nakiri and the nakiri will do veggie slicing better than gyuto. I have no idea what a santoku does well. For me it does everything worse than some other knife pattern will do.

 

[C-9]

The nakiri predates the usuba, and is one of the older Japanese patterns, unlike the santoku, which contrary to popular belief is not a thousands of year old pattern. A nakiri also behaves nothing like an usuba, and requires a completely different skillset to use. The only thing they share is a profile, so while a nakiri may very well resemble a double beveled nakiri, calling it "basically a double bevel usuba" is near meaningless. The santoku is a knife pattern meant for home use, to replace the nakiri, because its tip makes it more useful to the modern, post Meiji Japanese diet than the nakiri. A more accurate description of a nakiri is a thinner chef knife with the tip end cut off, giving you more flat chopping area than the equivalent size, and generally a thinner blade than the equivalent size gyuto.

As for

The gyuto will do veggie chopping better than the nakiri and the nakiri will do veggie slicing better than gyuto.

I have no idea what you are talking about.

 

[darkmoto]

I am squarely in the camp of thinking nakiri and santokus are wastes of space but some people like them

 

[C-9]

I like a nakiri, but I would agree that it definately is not a knife you need, and not a knife you should be buying if you're still rounding out your basic set of knives. There are other far more useful knives to buy first.

 

[Knife Outlet]

A more accurate description of a nakiri is a thinner chef knife with the tip end cut off, giving you more flat chopping area than the equivalent size, and generally a thinner blade than the equivalent size gyuto.

That's a curious thing to say. Gyutos and nakiris are designed for completely different applications. Usubas and nakiris are designed basically for the same application. Obviously you and I define the term chopping in different ways. Otherwise you would have understood what I was saying above.

For me chopping is what they teach people to do with a chef knife in culinary school. Nakiris are for slicing, not chopping.

 

[C-9]

Gyutos and nakiris are designed for completely different applications.

Yes they are, but theres a reason they aren't common anymore in Japan, and have been replaced by the santoku, a combination of a nakiri and gyuto. Theres also a reason why they're short, because both santoku and nakiri are cheaper, easier to handle, more convenient, less intimidating, and require less space than a larger gyuto. If you have a large gyuto though, and the space to use it, it can do anything a nakiri can.

Usubas and nakiris are designed basically for the same application.

Thy are both vegetable knives, but they are very different vegetable knives. Although the difference is not quite as dramatic, both a deba and fillet knife are used for filleting fish, they are vastly different knives in form and use. They also have significant differences, like the fact a deba can cut off the head of a fish.

If you're going to use weird definitions for chopping, then sure a knife designed around that technique and a technique designed for that knife work best when paired together.

 

[Knife Outlet]

Defining chopping as what they teach in culinary school is wierd? When did the santoku become commonplace in Japan? A couple of years ago I was told most Japanese had never seen one. I understand that filet knives and debas are used differently. So how are nakiris and usubas used differently?

 

[C-9]

Defining chopping as what they teach in culinary school is wierd?

They teach you that its the right way to chop an onion, I haven't heard the word chop to actually describe the technique much, only the action of chopping an onion (into slices ironically) or as a cleaving action i.e. chop bones, chop onion in half etc.

The santoku, which is synonymous with banno and bunka, and became popular as the Japanese diet westernized. Particularly in the post-war growth period, the santoku became common place, and a household item as more and more Japanese were able to afford meat and eat it as part of their regular diet and it replaced the nakiri as the standard knife. Whoever told you that the average Japanese person had never heard of a santoku a couple of years ago (that would be 2008 by the way) is clearly wrong. Had you stepped into any department store, supermarket or your local Daiso, you could have seen them. If you looked into the kitchen drawer of a typical Japanese family you'd probably find a santoku.

I think the fact that one knife is double beveled and the other is single beveled is pretty self explanatory that they need to used differently. The nakiri was traditionally used in more rustic places, and usually used to make food into edible bite size pieces. The usuba is found in places of finer dining where the precision of the chisel grind allows for finer and more delicate cuts, which are needed for garnishes and fancier preparations of food.