[TheForge] new knife almost OT:

[Peter Fels & Phoebe Palmer]

Wow!!!!
I've worked in fish markets..but nothing like that. The 
closest i've come was being part of cutting up a 350# 
Alaskan halibut. It took 3 guys all morning.
In one, on the Redondo Bch pier, there were 4 other guys 
named peter working there..and i was the bottom peter.
Sometimes, because of my low status, they'd send me out 
on the back porch ( where the customers couldn't see) 
with a barrel full of sand sharks and leopard sharks. 
Because there was no hope of keeping an edge on a knife 
doing that, i got an ugly club of a stainless steel knife 
to fillet the sharks with. They didn't age at all well in 
the barrel.
The fillets went in the display trays labeled " Gray Cod".

ries wrote:
> I have been to the Tokyo fish market, and seen these guys using these knives- they only cut the tuna flesh with them, not the scales.
> The rough cut is done early on, often before the actual fish seller even buys the tuna at auction.
> They buy, at 4 in the morning, a chunk of blood red tuna about the size of a block of ice from one of those old ice machines- a one foot cube or so- and that costs hundreds of dollars.
> Then, usually two guys wield the 6' tuna knife, to slice the mother chunks for sushi- somewhere between 1" and 3" in thickness, perfectly parallel, gorgeous in every way.
> 
> I also visited the neighborhood in Tokyo where they sell knives like that- there are two or three high end knife shops on the same few blocks. A decent, but not spectacular, chef's knife is several hundred. A good one- from a name brand maker, can easily break a thousand dollars, and goes up to double or triple that. I didnt price the tuna swords, but they are not cheap. Usually in a knife shop with 2000- 4000 amazing handmade blades of all sizes, there might be one or two of those tuna knives. 
> 
> Only a few fish wholesalers use them.
> 
> 
> ries
> 
> 
> On Aug 13, 2010, at 11:50 PM, Peter Fels & Phoebe Palmer wrote:
> 
> Tuna scales are real hard on a knife's edge. The 
> deckhands on the albacore and tuna runs used to sharpen 
> their knives with coarse files to put a sort of saw tooth 
> edge that would cut when partly dulled.
> 6'!! Goodness! Wanna see the arm on that guy!
> 
> Matt Stevens wrote:
>> On 14/08/2010 7:48 a.m., Andy Gladish wrote:
>>> The stain isn't too bad and it's on the other side.
>>> I put a bevel on both sides, this one- made one for my wife with single
>>> bevel and she complained, "this knife is too sharp. it goes through my
>>> (thin, cheap plastic) cutting boards!"
>> lol. I recently went to Japan & was quite interested in the different 
>> cooking knife shapes & sharpening techniques. The most "interesting" 
>> knife was the 6' long tuna filleting knife, picture extended sword with 
>> more flex and single bevel. Rather intimidating.
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> Ries Niemi
> Industrial Artist
> http://www.riesniemi.com/
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