Cooking web notes

Knowing Your Kitchen Knives And Cutlery

If you do a lot of cooking, it's important to have a complete set of high quality knives on hand. High quality, doesn't mean expensive!

There are many different types of knives now out on the market that perform particular tasks, but the following are the ones that every kitchen should have on hand.

Paring Knife for paring and slicing fruits, vegetables and other small foods. I feel that every kitchen should have 3 nice quality sharp paring knives. Why three? So that you can get others to help you in the kitchen during food preparation when you are entertaining a crowd.

Utility Knife for a variety of tasks. You should have 1-2 utility knives on hand. Make sure they are high quality and durable as they do heavy duty jobs.

Chef's Knife for chopping food. In my opinion, the sharper the better!

Poultry Knife for deboning and slicing chicken, turkey, duck and other fowl.

Bread Knife for slicing breads, rolls, bagels and muffins. Your bread knife should be long and have a serrated blade.

Kitchen All-Purpose Shears! Once you own a nice pair of Kitchen Scissors you will use them more than you think!

You should also invest in a nice knife sharpener and you should sharpen your knives on a weekly to bi-monthly basis depending on how often you are using them.

Knife Storage Rack for storing all your knives in. Knives should never be stored in a kitchen drawer, not only does that damage the blades but that is how accidents can happen. I have one set of knives stored in a knife block and another set of knives are stored (magnetized) to a knife rack that is attached to the inside of my pantry door.

These days when you buy high quality knives, they come with a nice warranty. Keep all your receipts and documentation for your purchase just incase you need to get it replaced in the future. Investing in high quality knives will last you a lifetime!

Written By: Shelly Hill Copyright © 2009