Hand Forged from Farm Scrap - The Culinary Knife Project

A quick full process forging video and some of the finished knives and other utensils from the culinary knife project started in 2012...most of the materials are reclaimed from farm equipment and tools...final project was a 10.5" hon-yaki yanagiba-influenced kiritsuke forged from a rasp with fukiurushi Wenge and Sapele handle. (all knives from the project are now in private collections)

Culinary knives are quite different from tanto and the other work I do in terms of geometry, tooling, forging, and finishing, and using traditional clay and water yaki-ire on such long thin blades is very challenging.

Despite the many cracked blades and hours of polishing with stones, I am glad to have tackled the project and to have learned a little more about the "other side" of cutlery making and bladesmithing...so glad to be back in home terrain now, though!

*forging tip: starting with a 45 degree cut makes forging of narrow tangs more efficient.

**astute observers will be able to spot the two cold shuts in the tang area, the closer one was filed out, the farther one was in an area where no heat treating or major stress would occur.