How To Hold A Knife And Chop Vegetables Like A Chef

November 15, 2015

Knife skills and your perfect body.

Doesn’t matter if you want to burn fat, build muscle or a combination of the two. A good diet is essential. Mess up here and you’ll be spinning your wheels like a car with summer tires in the first snowstorm of the year.

Getting your nutrition on point is easy once you’ve mastered a few of the basics. The first being able to handle yourself in the kitchen. At the heart of that are your knife skills.

Nothing will be more impactful to your enjoyment and success in the kitchen than a good set of knives and some knife skills.

One year for my birthday the Mrs sent me to a knife skills class.

It was kind of cool. We learned how to hold a knife and a bunch of fancy ways to cut fruits and veggies.

(I’ve been holding it wrong all this time. The first example was me.)

Knife Skills – How To Hold A Chef’s Knife

Knife Skills – How To Chop And Cut Like A Chef

Different Cuts

The Julienne Cut (long thin strips)
Dice (Cut into small squares. The Brunoise Dice is the smallest)
A Paysanne Cut (thin square slices)
The Chiffonade (thin cuts of herbs or leaf vegetables)
Mince (finely chopped think garlic)

How to hold a knife wasn’t the biggest take away from my knife skills class. Nor was it cutting an onion with the minimum amount of tears. Nor fancy ways to cut my veggies.

It was the knife.

As part of the class everyone got their own knife.

A Classic 8” Wusthof Cook’s knife.

This was the first time using a high end knife, and my life hasn’t been the same since.

Nothing beats a sharp knife in the kitchen. Not only is it safer but it makes slicing and dicing easier and more enjoyable.

Nothing beats a sharp knife. It’s safer & makes slicing & dicing easier and more enjoyable. #cooking https://t.co/lQasDAeBvo
@atlantatrainer

— Jason CSCS (@atlantatrainer) January 28, 2016

Picking A Knife

Picking the right knife isn’t easy.

Knives run the gamut in price, brand, and style. There’s practically a knife for every job in the kitchen. And sets can run in the thousands of dollars.

Though there’s no need to break the bank when choosing your perfect knife. It’s possible to get a great knife at a great price. All you need is one that gets sharp and stays sharp. What they like to call in the biz and holding an edge.

This edge is what makes all the difference.

Practically any knife you buy will be sharp. But the problem comes in keeping it sharp. Cheap knives dull quickly. The quality of the steel just isn’t there.

The other consideration is how it feels in your hand.

Don’t fuss or the type of knife. There’s only one…

a 10″ chef’s knife.

This bad boy will handle about 90% of your cutting needs.

One more knife

When you pick things up to cut them a chef’s knife is too much. For these occasions a paring knife is perfect.

think pealing, trimming fat, and seeding.

They’re cheap, and handy I recommend you pick one up. Again prices are all over the map. But at $7.95 this one is a no brainer.

Choosing the right kitchen knife

There are a lot of different knives in this video. If you’re on a budget stick with the two mentioned above.

Knife Skills – Keeping Your Knives Sharp

To keep your knives sharp you’ll need a sharpening or honing steel.

Cutting and chopping bangs up the fine edge of the blade making it dull. To remove these imperfections and get a sharp edge run the blade across a honing steel before each use.

All sharpening steels are about equal. So there’s no need to break the bank when you’re shopping for one. You can grab one on Amazon runs $10.

How To Keep An Edge On Your Knife

Key points:

hone your knife after each use
2- 3 strokes per side, max of 8
don’t press too hard
don’t have too steep of an angle

A sharpening steel does two things to keep your knife sharp:

it smooths out the rough edge
it helps straighten that edge after you’ve been cutting, slicing or chopping for a while

Because a steel is only removing imperfections you’ll need to put a new edge on your knife every 6 months to a year, depending on how often you use it.

When the time comes you have two choices:

[A] take it somewhere to have it done.
[B] grab a knife sharpener.

At less than 10 for a bargain Knife Sharpener it’s a no brainier to do it yourself. Not only do you save yourself the travel time, you’ll save money.

To have a professional sharpen just one knife, one time, will run about the same price as the knife sharpener.

Protect This House

The last necessity is a cutting board. It’s going to protect your counters and knives.

Again. You can go fancy or keep it simple.

However.

You don’t want to go too cheap. A bad board will ruin your knives.

While it isn’t pretty, a decent plastic board will do.

At 25 bucks it isn’t going to break the bank. So it’s a good idea to get 2…

[1] One for meat.
[2] Another for vegetables.

I guarantee a good knife will change your life. If you hate cooking a good knife will make all the difference. You’ll slice through everything with ease. And if your anything like me, you’ll look forward to getting out the knife to make meals.

Remember…

the more time you spend in the kitchen making your own meals, the better your body will look.

Happy choppin’ and stay strong,