Knife Features: Different Blade Textures
There was a time when I saw a knife simply as a sharp hunk of metal used to occasionally cut up some veggies. Not anymore. Besides knives specifically designed for very exacting tasks (e.g. tomato knives), there are other major differences. Is it a European-style knife or a Japanese-style knife? What kind of edge does the knife have? What style of handle does the knife have?
In this article, we’ll look at the various surfaces a knife can have. That standard surface, the most common texture for the flat of a blade. On more elaborate knives, however, there might be different textures. To improve their performance, knives might also be dimpled, hammered, or use a textured steel like Damascus.
Smooth
The standard, smooth steel on the flat of the blade is easiest to produce for most manufactures. A natural product of the grinding process, it’s easiest to just machine polish a flat surface and make that the flat of the blade.
An issue with the perfectly smooth surface is that food sticks to it more readily, especially wet foods, which most foods will be. Everyone who’s cooked before knows how annoying it is to have to scraped bits of minces garlic or slices of tomato off the side of a knife. This is why the textured surfaces were developed.
Dimpled
These knives are often incorrectly labeled “hollow ground” knives. This is an inaccuracy since hollow ground actually refers to a shape of knife edge, not to the grinding of hollows …