My Knife Roll Essentials

Every Chef has their own version of essential tools of the job, and I am no different. For me it all starts with a bag, I wanted one that was sturdy, stylish and easy to carry. I was very lucky to find a great deal on Amazon several years ago that has become the envy of many Chefs I’ve worked with since.

I do most of my work with a standard Western Style Chefs Knife, a Chinese Cleaver and a Paring Knife. I also like to use a Boning Knife and a Fish Knife when the situation calls for them, which depending on the workplace can be more or less often, for example, while working in the East Room as a Pastry Chef my main utensils were my Chefs Knife, and Palette Knives and Spoons, but when working in House Limerick I used my Fish and Boning Knives to excess. As a matter of fact there were days where I would be deboning 30 or 40 chickens for brining for service the next day, only to come in the next day to do the same again. The constant repetition and patient instruction I experienced there were massively helpful in refining my technique. While I do tend to use only a few knives depending on tasks, I do tend to be a bit of a magpie when it comes to shiny knives and other utensils, so I found my Knife Roll filling up very quickly. When you enter Culinary School you get a knife set, and mine consisted of:

• An 8 inch Chefs Knife

• A Fish Knife (flexible for skinning and boning fish)

• A Boning Knife (sturdy, and a medium length for deboning meat and poultry)

• A Carving Knife (serrated blade, very long, perfect for carving cooked meat, or for slicing bread and cakes)

• A Honing Steel (the long rod that many people call a sharpener. This is a bit of a misnomer, it doesn’t sharpen the blade, it just straightens it back up)

• A Paring Knife

• A Turning Knife

• A Parisian Scoop

• A Peeler

• A Silicone Spoon

• A Bench Scraper

• and Knife Bag

For me there were a few items I didn’t really need, but class requirements made me keep them in the roll.

Now on to what I keep in my roll:

• A Chinese Cleaver

• An 8 inch Chefs Knife

• A Carving Knife

• A Santoku (Not super necessary but it was one of the first knives I ever bought myself, and it feels wrong not to have it with me)

• A Fish Knife

• A Boning Knife

• A Paring Knife

• A Peeler (I like a Y shaped peeler for speed of use)

• Cooking Chopsticks ( a pair of extra long chopsticks for use while cooking)

• A set of offset Palette Knives

• A Carving Fork

• A Microplane Grater

• A pair of Quenelle Spoons (honestly not entirely necessary but I managed to get a pair for free, and they are useful sometimes)

• Plating Tweezers

• Saucing Spoons

• Silicone Spoons

Of course, as I said above, it’s all about personal preference what you choose to keep as an essential. There are some Chefs I’ve known that only used one knife for everything, but there were also Chefs that needed every knife in the world for any given task.