Shun Ken Onion Chef Knife Review

Shun Ken Onion 10" Chef's Knife

This knife is a pleasure to use, it puts a smile on my face every time I pick it up.  The Shun Ken Onion Knife has a very nice edge and great balance.  The handle design scared me at first and I thought, "Holy crap!  Is that thing going to work?"  I've got to say that this is the most comfortable knife I have ever used.  It WANTS to cut for you.  The handle design and curve of the blade creats a natural roll which glides.

As far as sharpness goes, the Shun is the sharpest knife I have ever used.  It significantly out performs the Henckel 4 Star 10" and the Wusthof Classic 8".  The angle on the blade is very shallow.  The only downside of this knife (besides the price) is the height of the blade which can make cutting fish difficult as the protein sticks to the blade since it is so tall.

 

Shun Ken Onion 10" Chef Knife Review
O	7	Carrot-Lengthwise Test	very smooth, no resistance, nice! Smiling!
O	7	Carrot-Crosswise Test	very smooth, no resistance, nice!
O	7	Shallot Test	very smooth, no resistance, clean dice w/o smashing the shallot
O	7	Potato Test	very smooth, no resistance, like hot knife through butter, made me smile.
O	6	Green Onion Test	smooth cuts but left a small amount of uncut strands, no bruising
O	7	Red Bell Pepper Test	smoth, cut all the way thru the skin
E	5	Salmon Test	cuts cleanly but sticks slightly to the blade
E	6	Paper Test	cut 98% the way thru 8 1/2" x 11" paper the long way. Note: this knife was not new "out of the box".
O		Comfort	Fantastic!  It wants to cut for you. All my chef collegues smile when they pick it up and start slicing something.
O		Balance	Very nice
	6.5	Total
Comfort is so subjective that I chose not to give it a detailed rating which would effect the overall score, and I chose not to rate Balance either.

 

Ranking Code

Overall Ranks O - Outstanding (7) E - Excellent (5-6) A - Average/Normal (3-4) P - Poor (0-2)

Detailed Ranks 7 - Outstanding, rarely attained. No effort is needed, hot knife thru butter realized. Makes you smile. 6 - Excellent, far above average. Almost no effort is needed. 5 - Above average. Some resistance is felt but cuts cleanly. 4 - Average professional knife. Takes a little work, may not cut cleanly all the time. 3 - Lower end professional knife. Have to focus on making the cut correctly, bruises, tears. 2 - Typical cheap knife. Almost worthless except for the most basic cutting. 1 - Sub-standard knife. Why bother. 0 - Garbage. Toss it.

 Buy the 10" Shun Ken Onion Knife at Amazon.com

 

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