CHEF KNIFE 8" Japanese Damascus Stainless Steel, High Carbon Sharp Kitchen Cutlery, Light & Ergonomic Gyuto

Simply put, I would like a lot of people to buy this knife so that I can get a matching paring knife. I cook for a living and am an avid camper so I know a good tool when I hold one and this knife delivers. When I bought mine a couple months ago, Okami knives only offered the 8 inch version. If they expand their offerings and continue to offer such rock bottom introductory prices I forsee my entire knife roll consisting of Okami knives.Pros:-Nice looking knife, simple and elegant, this is sure to catch the eye of whomever is watching. Comes in a spiffy box with a tip guard as well.-Extremely light. Your wrist will never get tired manipulating this knife for hours.-Wicked sharp out of the box. My roommate gave it the ultimate out of the box sharp test. He used the edge of this knife to peel back the outer layer of the epidermis on his left thumb without any pain or disturbing the subcutaneous layers.-High quality super hard steel (60-62 ish). Edge retention is amazing. I've been using mine daily at work and at home for three months. Without any maintenance on the edge it is still sharp enough to shave with.-Pakka wood handle is AWESOME. My favorite feature. I knew pakka wood was a quality construction material before I purchased this knife, but I am still blown away by how nice the grip feels. It just feels pleasurable in the hand, plus I have held it while both hand and handle were slick with myoglobin and grip was still super secure.-Well balanced-Price is rediculously good. If I made this knife I would charge $200 for it, but at the time of posting this review it is still selling for $90. I understand 90 dollars is not a small amount of money, but if you like to cook you are going to be using this knife every day. 90$ for something that gets daily use for a decade+ is a sensible investment.Cons-A little on the small side. I have the 8 inch version and the blade is a little smaller than 8 inches. I hold kitchen knives with a modified pinch grip and if I rest this knife on the cutting board two of my knuckles are touching as well. One of my coworkers who has very large hands (he's a very large man) can't use this knife for chopping. Definitely more suited for Japanese cutting than French style.-Half tang. I don't think this is a downer because it is so well constructed, but I know it will turn some people off.-Made in China. Same story as above, but their will be individuals who see that and say "Nope, not worth risking."-Super hard steel means this knife will carve through anything it is meant to cut like it's nothing. It also means if you hit a bone or aren't using a proper cutting board, or just use the knife on something hard, the knife is going to chip. I actually managed to damage my knife. I bumped it and it fell from my station about three feet to the tiled floor. Luckily the teensy-weensy little tiny chip that came off was on the spine so the structural integrity of the knife is still sound. If it had been on the blade edge (even as small a nick as it was) I would have had to pay a visit to the knife doctor and his grinder.-Light weight will catch some cooks off guard. If you are used to a big honkin' stainless steel knife that costs 20$ this will take some getting used to. With a heavy knife you sort of set it on it's course and let the wieght of the blade carry through the slice. Try that with this knife and you are going to have some weird slices.Like I said at the beginning, I hope Okami keeps making more products, because this one is awesome. I also think a t-shirt with the wolf head logo would look pretty snazzy if they ever wanted to offer one of those.

this is an excellent quality knife, especially considering it's price. I would recommend this any day over the "classic" line of the famous "S" brand of knives, just for sheer quality, much less much better value.Very good fit and finish, good ergonomics, good balance, good blade profile (not too much or too little "belly").I purposely took it in to work for a week, and purposely did over a day of prep just to try this knife out. It held up very admirably to the job through very tough veggies. The handle was well shaped and very slip resistant even when there was blood to deal with. The VG 10 core stood up well. I have honed it on a zirconium carbide hone, but haven't needed to sharpen it yet. We hand sharpen our knives on water stones. I have dozens of other VG10 core knives and so far, as expected, it has exhibited similar edge retention as other VG10 core knives. By now, with a "german steel" knife (whose hardness usually is near about 56 on the Rockwell scale), I would have already had to sharpen it properly (not just hone it).One small issue for home users, and this is NOT a bad thing. The steel in the core of this knife is harder (probably about 61 Rockwell) than most home sharpening steels (about 58-60). You might want to get a cheap 15-20 dollar GERAMIC "sharpening steel" (really a hone) just to touch it up every now and then. This knife is better steel than a regular "sharpening steel" so that one you got as part of the set of knives you have won't work too well just throw it out because the ceramic hone will also do a better job on your other knives as wellThe retailer got the item to me quickly. It was in a nice magnetic closing box and included a nice small cloth with their logo to wipe down the blade. The cloth will probably get lost, but it was a nice attention to detail and a sign of confidence in the mindfulness of it's construction.Even though I sample knives from some of the German mfgrs, I paid retail for this knife and consider it money well spent.