Satoshi Nakagawa Abura-Honyaki 240mm Gyuto - White #3

Satoshi Nakagawa is a relatively young blacksmith from Sakai, who has quickly gained a reputation as one of the most talented craftsmen in the very famous city of knives. He has been a teacher under Shiraki Hamono, but is now the head of his own workshop. Nakagawa-san's craftsmanship is truly top-shelf quality.

This knife is made in honyaki construction, which means it is a piece of steel, in this case Shirogami 3, which has been differentially hardened. You do this by putting clay on the back of the knife before hardening the knife. The clay causes the back of the knife to cool down more slowly, so that it becomes soft in the back and gives stability to the knife. The edge, where there is no clay on it, cools down faster and therefore becomes harder in the steel. This process also creates a lot of stress in the steel during hardening, which causes many honyakis to break during production. For this reason, honyakis cost significantly more than normal 3 ply knives. The combination of the softer back and hard edge gives a unique cutting experience that is very different from other knives.

Shirogami 3 or White 3 is a carbon steel, and is in the category of so-called white steel. Shirogami 3 is among the purest carbon steels from Japan, and for this reason it can be incredibly sharp, and is very easy to sharpen.

This knife is a gyuto, which is also popularly just called a chef's knife. This is 24 cm, and it is used for most tasks in the kitchen and is particularly good for slicing and chopping tasks in both meat and vegetables.