Salon Cut and Color or Cleaver and Boning Knives?


No cliffhanger here; we know which one I chose.  My hair is going to be a DIY affair.  I trimmed my bangs with the scissors of my Swiss Army knife.  and my hair color is from a box I bought at the Arab market.  No idea what is in it.  Probably something carcinogenic.

But I have my knives.

Knives are the most primitive of all tools, right up there with the semi-automatic and a tube of red lipstick.  Cooks will argue for hours about knives.  Here is my two cents.

I am not a knife snob.  I don´t have a huge knife collection and the brands don´t have to match.  I own two paring knives, two 6″ and 10″ German-style chef´s knives, two cleavers and a breat knife. My favorite small knife was made by a knife maker in Bali.  I could use it to chop down a bamboo forest and still slice tomatoes.

Instead of splurging at the salon, I bought a Wüsthof boning knife for $90, a fair price.  The blade is long and slender – perfect for working with meat.  A lot of brands have blades that are too wide, which makes boning difficult.  With boning knives, it is especially important that the blade is strong and flexible so it doesn´t snap.

Here´s where I become a knife heretic. most cooks put cleavers way down on the list.  Most own only one if they own one at all and they spend too much money on it.

The cleaver used most often is for chopping through bone.  In reality, it is a small axe.  It should be heavy and not expensive because it is going to get banged up.  Periodically, it will have to be ground on a wheel.  Sharpening it on a stone won´t work. The blade is too thick.

The other kind of cleaver is from Asia.  I have one and use it a lot.  It is not for chopping through bone as much as it is the Asian version of a chef´s knive.  However, the cutting skills for an Asian cleaver are different and must be learned.  Its blade is thin and the knife doesn´t weigh much.  The flat side of the blade is used for smashing garlic, ginger, peppercorns and other spices and for scooping up choped vegetables to cook in the wok.  This type of cleaver can be sharpened on a stone.

The third kind of cleaver – the one I just bought –  is halfway between the baby axe and the thin Chinese cleaver.  It has heft but a thinner blade.  It can also be sharpened on a stone.  This kind of cleaver is used for very specialized tasks, like chopping meat when you don´t want to grind it, for example when preparing steak tartar.  The knife I just bought is from the French manufacturers Déglon.  I paid $95, also a fair price.

So much for my rant on knives.  Time to sign off and head to my last class at Le Cordon Bleu.

PS: Next question: new dress or a 5o mm lens?