Know the knives in your kitchen

A well-equipped kitchen will contain a range of different knives. The following are a few of them:

Carving knife: This knife has a long, narrow blade and is ideal for slicing cooked meats.

Chef’s knife: Essential for chopping, slicing, dicing and mincing, this knife has a long triangular shaped blade that ranges in length from 6 to 12 inches. The edge is slightly curved so you can rock the knife for easy chopping.

Paring knife: This knife is used for cutting fruits, vegetables, meat and cheese.

Serrated knife: Sold in various sizes, the smaller knives, which are usually 5 inches long, are ideal for slicing through fruits and vegetables while the large ones cut cakes and breads evenly.

Utility knife: A small lightweight knife, which has a blade that is generally 4 to 7 inches long and is used for miscellaneous light cutting such as fruits and vegetables.

Boning knife: A knife with a thin short blade, typically 5 or 6 inches long, used to remove the main bone within a cut of meat, such as a ham or a beef roast. A boning knife will typically have a long narrow and rigid blade for ease of manipulation around bones and proportioned to the size of the bones being removed.

Fillet knife: A knife consisting of a thin flexible blade, typically 6 to 11 inches long is used for filleting fish.

Cleaver: A knife with a wide rigid blade approximately 6 inches in length, which tapers to a sharp cutting edge. This tool is used to chop, shred, pound or crush food ingredients and materials. The blade of the cleaver is thick, somewhat heavy and well balanced with a beveled cutting edge, which allows for ease of chopping through vegetables or materials that are hard.

Mincing knife: A knife that can be used to mince or cut foods into smaller bits for seasoning sauces, soups, salads, and other dishes. Mincing knives can be either single or double bladed to cut a variety of foods into very small pieces. A mincing knife is also referred to as a Mezzaluna, Mezzaluna chopper or Mezzaluna knife.

Oyster knife: A knife that is used to pry open the hard shell of an oyster or clam in order to remove the meat. Typically, the knife will have a sharp, beveled blade that can be inserted into the tightly closed shell to pry the shell apart.

Devein knife: A knife that is used to remove the large vein that runs down the length of a shrimp. A fork can be inserted in the back of the shrimp to pull out the vein or a deveining knife can be used to cut a slit down the length of the shrimp.

Cheese knife: This knife is thinly shaped to cut easily through soft or hard textured cheese. This knife may have a forked tip that is used as a lifter for pieces of cheese as they are cut. This knife may also be referred to as a forked-tip utility knife, which is used as a bar knife for cutting through citrus fruits or spearing garnishes for drinks as may be required for pickles, onions or maraschino cherries.

Clam knife: This knife is used to pry open the hard shell of a clam or an oyster in order to remove the meat. Typically, the knife will have a beveled edged blade that can be inserted into the tightly closed shell, twisting the blade to pry the shell apart.