by Tim Hayward
Nat Gilpin passed his knives to his grandson, Scott Grant Crichton, who also went on to a distinguished career in catering, beginning as a commis chef at the Baron of Beef in Gutter Lane in the City of London in 1968 and working later in hotels and on private yachts. Individually the knives are beautiful; as a collection they form a comprehensive memorial to a working chef.
ON CHINESE KNIVES
CHINESE AND FRENCH are the two great cuisines of the world, perhaps so exciting because they are so very different at such a fundamental level. Each focuses on different ingredients, different physical sensations in eating and different philosophical beliefs about benefits of various foods, but they differ most noticeably in the utensils used at table. Fine French cuisine is all about knives and forks while the Chinese have been eating with chopsticks since 1000 years before Christ. It’s thought that the sticks originated as an improvised method for moving hot food in pots while cooking but soon became the polite way to eat.
There is a theory that the chopstick’s popularity was supported by elements of Confucianism, in particular the belief that sharp, warlike instruments such as knives had no place at the civilised dining table. With no one in the dining room equipped to cut their food into bite-sized pieces, it becomes imperative that the food be properly cut up before serving (it is a bonus that food cut like this cooks more quickly over less fuel).
Chinese cuisine, therefore, relies entirely on the use of the knife in the kitchen… and a unique knife it is. The cai dao is sometimes referred to as a ‘cleaver’ because that’s the closest thing to it in our knife rolls, but in fact it is a similar tool to the French chef ’s knife – just a lot wider and without a point.
A cai dao is bewilderingly light in the hand as the blade, though unexpectedly large and often with a coarse-looking rough surface finish, is actually very slender. It can be used for up-and-down vertical chopping but also rocked or pushed/pulled like any other kitchen knife. A Chinese cook will always use a cutting block, usually made of wood and standing taller than a Western chopping board – at least 9 centimetres high. Historically this would have been a tree trunk or slice of log and crucially, it allows a different kind of cut. Using a raised block means that the cook’s hand is clear, his knuckles can’t hit the benchtop and he is able to flip the cai dao on its side and slice horizontally.* The raised cutting surface is so important to the use of the cai dao that it should almost be considered a part of the knife.
If you ever get a chance to watch a good Chinese cook, butcher or fishmonger work, it’s a remarkable choreography of entirely unique knife strokes which look immensely rapid and brutal but are in fact subtle and calculated. The same blade that will take the bony and cartilaginous head off a fish will then be used to scale it, gut it, fillet, slice it into transparent slices and fan them on a plate. It’s said that in more rural environments the cai dao is even used to split the firewood used to cook on. If you’re ever lucky enough to experience Peking duck presented with all the tableside ceremony, a chef will carve the cooked duck off the bone with deft strokes of the tip of a cai dao; and, though the flat of the blade can be used to smash garlic or ginger to a pulp, the sharp heel is just as often used to peel them. Perhaps the best indication of the delicacy of the cai dao is the term for their finest ‘chiffonade’ cut: ‘silver pine needle’.
The second knife of the Chinese chef is a cleaver. A proper, heavy one with a thick spine and a broad wedge-shaped grind. It’s kept sharp enough to be capable of cutting through bone – many Chinese preparations involve cutting meat into small pieces but retaining part of the bone for texture and flavour. And because the cook is so adept with the cai dao, some of its duties cross over.
For some reason the cai dao, for all its history, versatility and just total coolness, has not caught the imagination of Western chefs as much as the specialised knives of Japan. This is a pity because good examples are available through Chinese stores for very little money and are an absolute treat to work with.*
* A Western chef can make this horizontal cut but to do so he has to drag his board to the edge of the bench and lean awkwardly. The alternative is to use a blade that will flex to horizontal while still keeping one’s knuckles clear of the board. This is probably why such knives have only appeared in Western kitchens in recent years as flexible steel has become available.
* Maintain a Chinese blade like any other by cleaning it with a damp cloth and oiling it lightly but be very careful never to immerse it completely while washing. Water can work itself into the ferrule and up into the handle where it rots the wood and rusts the tang. You really don’t want the blade of your chopper snapping off the handle mid-swing.
CAI DAO
BLADE LENGTH: 206MM
OVERALL LENGTH: 310MM
WEIGHT: 281G
MANUFACTURED BY: LEUNG TIM CHOPPERS CO.
MATERIALS: LAMINATED STEEL, HARDWOOD
USES: GENERAL PURPOSE
LEUNG TIM CHOPPERS are regarded as some of the best in the world. Compared with Japanese- and German-made blades they appear functional to the point of rustic, with irregular forging marks on the flat sides of the blades, rough-cut backs and edges, and tangs thrust right through the handles and roughly hammered flat at the back. They are not something that could, on the face of it, be considered elegant and yet there’s something incredibly appealing about their complete fitness for purpose. I have enormous sympathy for a maker who’s obviously thought, ‘what the hell is the point of polishing this thing up and giving it a finish like a piece of jeweller y when it’s going to be used hard, by an artisan cook, every day?’ It couldn’t be further from the aesthetic of the Japanese knife and yet a Leung Tim cai dao is beautiful in the same way that an old blacksmith’s hammer is – it arrives with a lifetime of patina and dripping with butch chic.
The blade length is pretty much the same as the standard Western chef ’s knife and weighs only a couple of grams more. There’s a slight curve on the blade which allows for a rocking–chopping action, and because it takes a beautifully sharp edge easily, you very quickly find yourself using the entire cutting edge, from heel to tip, for all kinds of surprisingly delicate tasks.
TRADITIONAL CHINESE CLEAVER
BLADE LENGTH: 218MM
OVERALL LENGTH: 330MM
WEIGHT: 538G
MANUFACTURED BY: LEUNG TIM CHOPPERS CO.
MATERIALS: STAINLESS STEEL, HARDWOOD
USES: HEAVY BUTCHERY AND FISH WORK WHERE BONES NEED TO BE CUT
THE TRADITIONAL CHINESE CLEAVER is a heavy beast. Because the blade is used with more force it needs weight, which would soon damage a delicate edge, so it’s ground into a wider wedge. This means there’s no point in all the careful laminating that makes for a sharpenable core, so the cleaver is forged out of a single slug of metal.
This traditional cleaver has little refinement and, though a regular user would get used to it, the cutting force is applied towards the back of the blade where most of the weight seems to sit. And it’s some serious weight. The cleaver is a monster to heft, the spine a beefy 6 millimetres thick and, if well maintained, quite capable of chewing through the heftiest of beef bones in a few swift strokes.
CHINESE CLEAVER (LIGHT, FRONT-WEIGHTED)
BLADE LENGTH: 182MM
OVERALL LENGTH: 285MM
WEIGHT: 454G
MANUFACTURED BY: LEUNG TIM CHOPPERS CO.
MATERIALS: HIGH-CARBON STEEL, HARDWOOD
USES: FUNCTIONS AS A DOMESTIC CHOPPER FOR LIGHT BONES, CAN PERFORM SOME OF T
HE FUNCTIONS OF A CAI DAO
THIS MORE EVOLVED VERSION of the cleaver is a smart hybrid. The blade is laminated, the edge sharp and though the spine is thick for strength, a concave profile to the face means that the blade remains light. Cleverly, though, the blade shape widens to the front so the centre of gravity is moved towards the tip. It’s a brilliant adaptation. The extra weight upfront increases the leverage when the chopper is swung and alters the balance so the whole thing feels more like a cai dao in terms of maneuverability. It doesn’t feel quite right for fine work but, given the brief – a tough, all-round tool for working cooks – the front-weighted cleaver certainly does the job.
HENRY HARRIS
HENRY HARRIS IS ONE of London’s best-loved and respected chefs. His training was classical and his CV lists some of the most influential kitchens in the country. His knowledge of cooking technique, ingredients and food history is second to none but his attitude to his knives borders, by his own admission, on the obsessive. Henry has carefully preserved every knife he has ever owned and worked with professionally, and can tell the story of each.
These days Henry can afford the knives he wants and has some expensive and exclusive beauties in his knife roll but, possibly uniquely among collectors, he uses every knife he buys for both work and pleasure and has the talent to test them to their limits.
Henry understands knives as deeply as he loves them and seems comfortable talking about the relationship...
HH: When I left Leith’s School of Food & Wine in ’83, the chef ’s roll contained the proper original Sabatier carbon-steel knives. I’d always looked at blunt knives at home and at my father flicking the sharpening steel up and down and not really making them any sharper, so when I first got them I remember thinking, ‘God, it’s remarkable. Sure, I might not be able to cut an onion because the blade goes black – but when I use this very coarse sharpening steel you can almost see it reaming off either side of the edge and it gets sharp again.’ I guess that was the start.
Once I started working in a restaurant I bought a couple of stainless-steel knives which always appear to be a lot more practical. I was immediately frustrated because once that edge has gone the first time you really struggle. They’re great workhorse tools, and they served me very well, but I was always thinking there’s something not quite right about them.
I spent years sort of satisfied with the knives I’d got and then my wife bought me a nakiri from Jay Patel. It came with a little leaflet explaining that it was ‘Aogami #2 Blue Paper steel’, and I thought, here’s something I can waste days over, trawling the internet and looking at stuff. Then as I started working with the knives the world opened up – it was so much more pleasurable.
I’d been worried about knives being too light, but in fact the right knife doesn’t have to weigh a lot. It’s about strength and how hard you can make that cutting edge without making it brittle. And then you begin to learn how much better a truly sharp blade works with the ingredients. You slice an onion and you don’t cry; you cut a piece of fish or meat and that cut surface looks quite different. Smooth, pristine and beautiful.
I don’t play the violin or the cello, but when I’m trying to show someone how to use a knife I ask them to think of someone playing the violin and them drawing the bow across the strings to make one note. Draw it through. The knife will do it. If your knife is sharp it will do the whole thing. I tasted something in the kitchen the other day where you could tell from eating the chopped onions that they’d used a blunt knife. There was a toughness to them because they’d been torn rather than chopped.
It started almost ten years ago and I just started collecting at probably a faster rate than I should have done.
And I guess I’m a hoarder. The old blades? Well, they’re useless… and they’re not. I sharpen up some of the original Sabatiers and they’re not a bad knife. What I’m annoyed about is that I haven’t got rid of the various cheap knives. I suppose it’s a bit like the way I struggle to get rid of cookery books. I’ve got some really bad cookery books, but if someone’s gone to the trouble to write about food – even if I disagree with their point of view – I think it requires investigation and that aids your progression and maturity as a cook. It’s the same way with knives. The experience with them, good or bad, all helps to develop your character and skills.
There is only one knife that I really dislike as a knife, and, I suspect, for the keen non-professional home cook, its the most popular knife: the santoku. I hate it as a knife. I suppose if you were going camping it would be a useful knife to have, because it’s multipurpose. I go for the right knife for the job. When I’m cooking I make sure that they’re there, in the same way that a carpenter has his rack on the wall or his box with his tools laid out. I wipe the knife, put it down and pick up the next appropriate one. The santoku is good at doing many things but to me it’s a compromise. It will do the job but it won’t be as good a job as if I had the right knife there, which I probably would anyway. If that makes sense.
These days I’d rather have a nakiri, a gyuto, some kind of carving knife, either Japanese or Western and something small. That is probably all I need.
I’ve met knife collectors who spend thousands of pounds on beautiful knives that were designed to skin animals, to gut animals, to cut them, slice them, portion them, to turn vegetables into suitable shapes to cook beautifully... and they put them in a cabinet. They probably wouldn’t sharpen their knives and they’re worried about getting marks on the blades.
I think a knife comes with the spirit of the person who’s made it and he opens it up for the user. The knife has a spirit imbued into it by the bladesmith that enables the user to give it character, so I almost look forward to the moment I get a first scratch on the blade. My Murray Carter gyuto has got some scratches on it but I know exactly where they are and how they came about. It was because I was distracted, it was on a bone, it was on another piece of metal. But they are there, they are part of my knife. And as I use it and sharpen it, over the years, that blade will change shape slightly – but I bought it to use it and so the real pleasure in owning it is in cutting, slicing and carving.
ON JAPANESE KNIVES
JAPANESE SUPREMACY in the manufacture of kitchen knives came about almost certainly by the unintended consequences of a couple of imperial edicts.
In 1868 Japan underwent huge political upheaval in which full power was restored to the Emperor Meiji who, in the period up to the turn of the twentieth century, turned the country from a feudal to a modernised nation.
Four years later it was announced that the Emperor and his family regularly partook of meat. Meat-eating had been largely prohibited in Japan since 675, partly by legal decree and partly as it was taboo in Buddhist belief, though it could be eaten for medical purposes in the belief that it increased physical strength. Aristocrats would occasionally indulge in yakuro, ceremonial hunts at which the quarry would be eaten and citizens who could afford to could go to momonjiya – specialist animal restaurants.
The Japanese had looked at Western visitors and associated their size and physical strength with the practice of meat-eating so, as part of his attempt to ‘civilise’ and modernise Japan, the Emperor actively encouraged its consumption. On March 28 1876, the Meiji government issued Haitōrei, one of a series of edicts designed to crush the last influence of the feudal Samurai class. Haitōrei forbade the carrying of weapons in public and, at a stroke, put
swordsmiths with a thousand-year tradition of forging and maintaining exquisite blades, out of work. In a culture that respected the arts of the kitchen almost as much as the arts of war, beautiful culinary knives were an obvious use for the swordsmiths’ skills.
The oldest of the Japanese blade shapes is the deba, a chopper-style slicer of a similar pedigree to the Chinese cai dao but with a point – great for taking the heads off fish and filleting. The second type, the usuba is reminiscent of the vernacular and improvised blades of many of the vegetarian cultures of South and East Asia, the simplest possible execution of a straight, sharp cutting edge. There’s no need for a point, in fact it’s a liability in a busy kitchen, and the best way to use them, entirely different to the Western cooking knife, is without a chopping board, with the vegetable held in the hand.* The third shape is the yanagiba, the willow leaf. Where the deba chops downwards and the usuba turns vegetables in the hand, the long yanagiba blade is drawn through boneless meat and fish in a single, long stroke. Though each blade can be used in other ways, each, at its root, is perfectly adapted to one particular cutting style.