Patina question: What's that funky taste!?

mnblade

mnblade

Joined
Feb 7, 2000
Messages
6,637
Today I took my newish carbon steel Boker trapper and decided to finally knock off that shine!

I washed the blades in hot, soapy water, then rubbed 'em down with alcohol. Most of the afternoon, I've been slowly slicing away at an apple, letting the sticky juice get all over the blades. The patina is coming in rather nicely. But the apple slices have a funky taste. (If it's going to kill me, we can raffle off all my knives!)

Any idea what exactly I'm tasting? And how long will this last? Is it just a new-patina kind of thing? I mean, I use an old carbon steel knife in the kitchen quite often and it doesn't impart any noticeable taste to the food it cuts. :confused:
 
Carbon steel does impart a strange taste to food. Some people don't notice it, but some do. I don't know what it is; I assume it's some sort of chemical reaction. Food prep is one of the areas that I feel stainless is functionally superior to carbon steel.
 
But, like I said, I have an old Dexter carbon steel boning knife we use in the kitchen all the time and I never get any odd taste from it. Strange.
 
I get that all the time eating apples, it's harmless. Your right though, for some reason some carbons steel blades do it worse than others.

Have you had it start staining the apple while your cutting it? :D

I have noticed that it seems to be worse with new blades that are not properly patinized (did I just make up a word??), once your blade gets good and dark it seems to lessen and even stop when cutting apples.

And 1075 carbon steel seems to do it worse than 1095, and 0170-6C even less.
 
The Last Confederate said:
... it seems to be worse with new blades that are not properly patinized (did I just make up a word??), once your blade gets good and dark it seems to lessen and even stop when cutting apples.
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True. I have an Old Timer Middleman Jack with blades as black as a crow in a coal mine, and when I quarter apples for my kids with it, it doesn't impart any noticeable taste.

BTW, kamagong, I too generally prefer stainless for food prep overall. I'm just cutting up this apple to patina the blade.
 
The funny taste will go away once you get a good deep patina on it. Once it get patinized (yeah, I really like that word!) I guess it seals off the steel surface.:thumbup:
 
I have heard,from some old timers,that when a carbon blade gets real patina'd up,it kinda "seals" the steel,making it more corrosion resistant,than when new.Perhaps,the newer blades,that have not seen as much action,give off more "carbon" taste.
Also,I had a MooreMaker,that got a patina on it way faster,then a Queen made Winchester.Could've been just the foods they saw.
Same old timer,told me the Vadallia Onion,would do the best job,for the patina process.
-Vince
 
I patinized my CV soddie Jr. and cut up a block of cheese afterwards, and it left this dark black film on it. Really gross looking. I threw the slices away, grabbed my SS Peanut, and continued. Don't know if it's toxic, but it looks gross.
 
ElCuchillo said:
I patinized my CV soddie Jr. and cut up a block of cheese afterwards, and it left this dark black film on it. Really gross looking. I threw the slices away, grabbed my SS Peanut, and continued. Don't know if it's toxic, but it looks gross.
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That definatly should not happen!

What and how did you patinize, and did you wash the blade off well in hot soapy water after? If you let a patina form, the only thing I can think of is that the blade was not wiped off well before you sliced the cheese.

Something not right there.

But how's the hand comming along?
 
Glad you didn't "cut the cheese". That would definitely have an effect on the flavor, probably gross as well.
 
The Last Confederate said:
I get that all the time eating apples, it's harmless. Your right though, for some reason some carbons steel blades do it worse than others.

Have you had it start staining the apple while your cutting it? :D

I have noticed that it seems to be worse with new blades that are not properly patinized (did I just make up a word??), once your blade gets good and dark it seems to lessen and even stop when cutting apples.

And 1075 carbon steel seems to do it worse than 1095, and 0170-6C even less.
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Knives made from files (W1 or W2?) seem to impart that flavor the most.

I really try to use stainless for food prep.
 
jackknife said:
That definatly should not happen!

What and how did you patinize, and did you wash the blade off well in hot soapy water after? If you let a patina form, the only thing I can think of is that the blade was not wiped off well before you sliced the cheese.

Something not right there.

But how's the hand comming along?
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No, I guess I did not wipe it off that well. I ran water over it, but didn't use soap. Not knowing much about the patina process, I wasn't sure if it would come off or not. I have since learned different.
As for the hand, It's good. All the little teeth holes are closed up, and the deep gash that exposed my tendon is closed up. The skin at the surface is still opened, but everything up to it closed up real nice. It'll leave a nasty scar, but.... oh well. War stories.
 
ElCuchillo said:
No, I guess I did not wipe it off that well. I ran water over it, but didn't use soap. Not knowing much about the patina process, I wasn't sure if it would come off or not. I have since learned different.
As for the hand, It's good. All the little teeth holes are closed up, and the deep gash that exposed my tendon is closed up. The skin at the surface is still opened, but everything up to it closed up real nice. It'll leave a nasty scar, but.... oh well. War stories.
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War stories indeed! How many others here will be able to point to a spot on their hand and tell their grandkids, "And that's where the gator that I was wrestling bit me" and actually mean it! That'll take you to a whole new level of cool. :cool:
 
One bad part about my job? Other then the danger, that is. When I'm done, when my body tells me it's had enough, when I hang up my gator rasslin boots for good, what the heck else am I going to do? I mean, what's cooler then what I do now? What will I do that will keep me interested?
Maybe I can become a knife maker.
Ooh. I like that.
 
That was gonna be my suggestion. Or you could become a sheath maker. You should be able to get a few gator hides here and there. ;)
 
I think the taste is probably small amount of steel/iron left behind. Some people are more sensitive to it, and some can smell it. The patina should minimize it as other noted.

The patina is FeO (iron +2 oxide), which does protect from rust Fe2O3 (iron +3 oxide) somewhat. It's essentially the same thing as "blueing" on a gun, but happens naturally.

I was in a water fight my freshman year in college and "lost" when I came around a corner and was met by a guy with a trash can full of water (this was indoors in a dorm, naturally!). I had my first Schrade 8OT stockman in my pocket, by the time I realized I should check it, it was well on its way to a nice, dark patina. There was some orange rust on the surface, but it wiped off easily and the blackened surface was underneath.
 
jackknife said:
The funny taste will go away once you get a good deep patina on it. Once it get patinized (yeah, I really like that word!) I guess it seals off the steel surface.:thumbup:
Click to expand...

I cleaned the patina off my Opinel No. 8 (which I seem to think is 1075), which I use every day for food handling, and noticed that it went back to imparting a slight metalic twang in food.

I instantly realised it was a mistake to want the blade shiny, and I'm gradually letting the patina reform. If I want a shiny blade I'll get something in stainless steel.
 
Hey guys, I just became a paying member of this forum after eavesdropping for a couple of months. My main reason was this traditional folders forum. Could someone give me a start-to-finish recipe for patinizing my CV? Thanks, Mike
 
malextwo said:
Could someone give me a start-to-finish recipe for patinizing my CV? Thanks, Mike
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There are several recipes. The simplest is to fill a glass with just enough (to submerge the blade in, not the guard/handle) of regular store-bought lemon juice or vinegar, and let your knife sit in it for a couple hours. Of course, you want the steel nice and clean (hot water and dish-soap, followed by a wipe-down with alcohol, works well) beforehand; otherwise any greasy fingerprints etc will show up spotty on the "patinized" blade. Very dilute acids plus time will put a deep, dark, almost-black blue on high-carbon steel. This will look cool as a polar bear's grin (IMHO) and go a long way to prevent corrosion, but it scratches off fairly easily. In fact, if you don't like it, 0000 steel wool and a touch of elbow-grease is all you need to take it off.

Birchwood-Casey's cold blue kit works well, too. Follow the directions, but do the whole procedure 3 or 4 times instead of twice.

In either case, you will notice a nasty stank while the steel soaks, much like when your mom used to have her friends over to give each other perms. This will go away when you stop the chemical reaction by neutralizing in baking soda or even plenty fresh water.

I've never done hot-bluing or other more complete ways of "sealing" a high-carbon blade, so I can't speak to that. I suspect hot-bluing would be more durable.

I confess that I can taste the steel in many of my high-carbon knives. I mean, when I give a clean knife a lick (eww! yeah right, like you never licked food off your knife.) I can taste the difference between my carbon Master Hunter and my stainless Frost's Clipper. The MH tastes like steel, the Clipper doesn't taste like anything at all. I have not noticed any residual taste on foods that I cut with either knife, nor have my woman and kids.

If you're at all sensitive to this (some people can't tell, some people really hate it), I agree you should stick to quality stainless steels for your food-prep knives.

Sorry, I don't have any real answers, I just find this topic interesting and I thought I'd toss in my $.02.
 
My sodbuster hasn't left that taste in a while now. As more time and use of the CV accumulates more patina, the taste will go away.
 
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