Japanese Santoku 6.5"

The Santoku knife design is one of balance and versatility. Its size and blade shape and grind lend to its roles, including excelling at long vertical slices and chops. The wide blade also helps in moving food from the cutting surface to the pan. This knife is a great choice for processing vegetables of all sizes, quickly and in large amounts and is a great choice for a cooking enthusiast.

The blade for this knife contains 90 layer hand forged Damascus pattern welded steel. The knife has Japanese VG-10 Takefu Hitatchi steel core laminate between the Pattern Welded Swedish 19C27 and 302 Stainless steel sides. VG-10 stands for V Gold 10 ("gold" meaning quality), or sometimes V-Kin-10 (V金10号) (kin means "gold" in Japanese), and is a cutlery grade stainless steel produced in Japan. VG-10 is a stainless steel with a high carbon content.

According to Takefu, the Cobalt makes the substrate stronger, and the addition of Moly and Vanadium form harder carbides increasing the wear resistance and thus improving edge retention. Additionally, VG-10 has excellent corrosion resistance, making it a fantastic all-round steel.​ 

After the grinding is done, the knife is heated in a computer controlled oven to precisely 1080°C (1976°F) and then quenched in a circulated air quench. To reach the 61 HRC hardness for the blade it was been subzero treated for 2 hours at -80°C (-112°F) in dry ice. This is also called cryogenic hardening or sub zero treatment. The super cool temperatures transform the steel structure from austenite into martensite. Cryogenic hardening relieves some stress, raises the Rockwell hardness by 1-3 points and refines the internal grain structure of the steel. The knife is then annealed for 2 hours in a tempering oven of 220°C (428°F).  

The handle for this knife is hand shaped out of a block of 5600 year old English Bog Oak  and Elk horn. Traditional Japanese Saya Bog Oak sheaths with leather inlay for the blade care and elk horn safety pegs. Inscription on the Saya sheath are 4 elements in Japanese - Wind. Fire. Water. Earth - all are used to make each of part of the knife. Wind, Earth and Water for the bog oak to grow and for elk to live. Earth, Fire and Water to make the iron and steel and to forge and harden the blade