Kitchen Knives

[C_Claycomb]

I am not sure if bamboo is much better...very tough stuff and tends to have a lot of resin to hold it together.

I did much the same thing for my dad once. He had a collection of horrible plastic boards that all had stains, so we bought him a tempered glass board. What were we thinking??!!??

 

[Robson Valley]

Not too many years ago, China experienced a massive die-off of bamboo. Synchronous self-destruction, so it seemed. Even a threat to the Panda population, as I recall. Anyway, they have been trying to make stuff out of the dead bamboo ever since.

I can bleach off the stains on my plastic sheets but the caustic nature of the dish washing detergent gets the surfaces biologically clean. Can't see a damn thing on the brown or grey ones! Blue, orange, yellow, red and green don't look so pretty any more. But being able to roll the sheets to pour out fine dice is very useful.

Used for years, I'm still impressed with the cut resistance from a variety of cleavers which I sharpen.

I have a wood one, a slab of Bird'seye patterned maple and a junker off cut of a pine book shelf. Slathered with olive oil, they are just fine.

 

[Mesquite]

These two swedish army chefs knives are my go to knife in the kitchen, simple but very sharp. The top one is about 1mm thick and the bottom one about 1.5