How to Buy and Hold Chef Knives

This is the first in our series with the pro's at George Brown Chef School. Chef Higgins will walk us through buying and holding knives.

How to Buy and Hold Chef Knives John Higgins: Good morning, my name is John Higgins. I have the pleasure to be in t he deck in George Brown Chef Bryan at Chef School in downtown Toronto. This is my wonderful friend, the chef of The Chef’s House, Chef Oliver Li and we’re going to be doing some demonstrations this morning. People always say the chef, what they are actually going to buy? You have to really think of the task that you're going to be using. For instance, you're going to be slicing, you're going to be dicing, are you going to be carving? A very, very important. But the one thing about knife is getting the knife that feels comfortable in your hand. And trust me, there’s lots and lots of companies out there that’s selling their wares and they're telling you that they stay sharp forever but there is only one ginsu and we don’t use that in the kitchen here, the chefs school. One of the important things is when you're holding the knife, I'm sure Chef Oliver will agree with me here, is the fact that to hold it in your hand, your forefinger and put your thumb. I'm going to put my thumb over the balsa here and here and just keep it so it really feels almost like a golf club. You play golf or you play baseball, you want to get something that’s nice and comfortable. Oliver Li: Nice and comfortable, steady in your hands. Yes. John Higgins: Because one of the things in the kitchen, what happens is you're going to be doing this motion for a long time. You want to make sure it feels comfortable and it feels nice. And you have wooden handles, you have plastic handles, etc. So I mean definitely, I know my preferences of knife and all my knife company’s preferences going to be but I have a selection of knives. I just don’t know one from one company, I've got six or seven knives, I'm sure it’s— Oliver Li: Yeah, we have so many, I mean, I have quite knife collection. But the most important are the chef’s knives and the utility knives where chefs hangs his hand and the small paring knife and the steel, that’s probably the most common knife, we use in the kitchen. John Higgins: And the most important thing of all is to make sure the knives are sharp because there's nothing worse than you cut yourself with a blood knife, it’s twice as bad because you're putting so much pressure and trust me, I have done a demonstration in India a couple weeks ago and I was telling everyone that you should make sure the knives are sharp and the whole thing and two seconds later I cut myself. They feel to many cover and I was back on doing the demonstration. You want to buy a good quality knife. You don’t have to buy 20 knives, you’ll get three knives, I mean, I think at home I have a 50-50 knife in my drawer but it’s always a two or three I use, that’s it, the same with wife, two or three knives were used not so.