# How useful is a deba or yanagiba if you don't regularly break down whole fish?



## Sharp-Hamono (Mar 18, 2017)

It seems that Japanese single bevel knives are highly specialized to Japanese cuisine, with some of the more common types being mainly only used to break down or prepare whole fish. I understand that the usuba is a vegetable knife, but specialized to a certain kind of shaving cut, rather than necessarily chopping on a cutting board. I'm just wondering how many people who own single bevel knives regularly find a wide variety of uses for them, aside from basically butchering fish or preparing sashimi, that a gyuto + petty knife kit isn't well suited for? and what sorts of things are you using them for?

I apologize if this is kind of a "basic" question. I have only ever used double bevel knives and I don't commonly break down whole fish or prepare sashimi, but I see a lot of interest on KKF in these types of knives among presumably Western professional and amateur cooks. It's one of those questions that's been nagging at me for a while, but I never had the opportunity to ask in a thread naturally or saw explained by someone in context of their interest in single bevel knives.


----------



## LifeByA1000Cuts (Mar 18, 2017)

Uhhh, this is a loaded question 

Small, still relatively thin deba (think something like Tojiro FD570) as an in-hand peeler... or to get thin slices off fruit...
Heavy deba as a mincer (Something like the F901 - obviously with very controlled force - not much needed  or even as a general purpose cooking knife when the mood strikes (it can do that if you are mindful which part of the profile you use). Or for getting zest of citrus fruit (if carbon steel, make sure there is already good patina).

Slicers can be surprisingly useful when working with raw doughs...


----------



## Mucho Bocho (Mar 18, 2017)

Sharp Hamono, I think you answered your question. Single bevel knives are so specialized. They can be used for their non-designed task, but that would be illogical.


----------



## Ruso (Mar 18, 2017)

My deba and Yanagi look cool, but have no use.


----------



## Matus (Mar 18, 2017)

I have a 180 mm single bevel petty from Ittetsu (JKI) that I love. It is nuch thinner than a Yanagiba would be. I use it mostly around boneless meat (removing silver skin, dicing), but since it is so thin it can be used for most tasks you would use a normal petty for. There is of course some steering when cutting an orange in half, but it can be compensated with technique. It is one of the knives I realy, really like. I waited nearly a year for one and it was worth it.


----------



## daveb (Mar 18, 2017)

I enjoy having Deba (2) and Yani (1) though their use is infrequent. When I have a task that I can use them for I know I have exactly he right knife. And I also look for occasions to use them. When I buy fish, I buy the whole fish, not the filets and especially not the (shudder) pre-packaged fillets. I consider myself fortunate that I can have a knife (or three) that I don't use regularly - if I ever have to minimize they will go.

I do have the bad habit of picking up an extra Yani or Takohiki from time to time. I should know better. It will sit for awhile, I'll use it a couple times then common sense will take over. The extra I'll part with.


----------



## brooksie967 (Mar 18, 2017)

I've had this talk before and my opinion on the matter still stands.

Usuba are great for mincing fresh herbs or just doing insanely thin cuts of anything that isn't crunchy/crusty. Of course doing peel cutting but who has time for that or is honestly any good at it at home? I'm not but it's still fun to try every once in a while. 

Yanagi are far more useful IMO. I use mine whenever I'm breaking down big portions of boneless uncooked protein as I don't have a suji. Slicing big thick steaks? My 330mm vintage yanagi goes through 4 or 5 inches with one pull cut. Slicing any boneless protein into amazing thin cutlets for quick frying is also a breeze with one. Personally i wouldn't use the fragile edge on any kind of meat with a crust.


----------



## Keith Sinclair (Mar 18, 2017)

Have a smaller 240mm yanagiba that I slice proteins with. Like Dave said have kept one for when I do cut sashimi or make sushi for family. Sold my longer yanagiba's used at work. Yes they are fish knives. It is not much reason, they are cool knives that have fragile edges & get razor sharp. Plus you get to learn how to sharpen a single bevel. You can get a smaller quality carbon yanagiba for home use. If you are being totally practical & do not have any single bevel lust a Suji is more versatile for all around slicing.:whistling:


----------



## LifeByA1000Cuts (Mar 18, 2017)

@keithsaltydog would not especially the off-label uses (where you just need much, much more slicing length than a chef knife) be best served with a really really long one?

(Yep, still wondering what would be the perfect tool for a sub-hobby of mine, seitan dishes. As I mentioned in some other thread, the raw stuff is its own kettle of non-fish to work with...)


----------



## Matus (Mar 18, 2017)

Sounds like I _need_ to buy a full size Yanagiba


----------



## TimoNieminen (Mar 18, 2017)

Sharp-Hamono said:


> I'm just wondering how many people who own single bevel knives regularly find a wide variety of uses for them, aside from basically butchering fish or preparing sashimi, that a gyuto + petty knife kit isn't well suited for? and what sorts of things are you using them for?.



Single bevel knives work well for cutting thin slices. My yanagiba and usuba get very little use, but I use deba for cutting hard salami and Chinese BBQ pork/char siu into thin slices.


----------



## _PixelNinja (Mar 19, 2017)

Single bevel knives excel at what they are designed for  outside of their intended purpose, the pretty much suck.


----------



## StonedEdge (Mar 19, 2017)

The only single bevels I own are a 270mm white#2 yanagiba and a 150mm Swedish carbon honesuki. The chicken knife gets a lot of use as I buy whole chickens from a farmer friend and break them down as I please. The yanagiba literally only gets used when I'm slicing sashimi or skinning/portioning large fish fillets. Once in a while I'll use it to trim silver skin off a larger cut of some animal. They are indeed specialized blades but when used for their intended (ish) purposes nothing else compares. Do I regret getting either of those knives? Never in a million years.


----------



## Sharp-Hamono (Mar 20, 2017)

What about a single bevel kiritsuke? That one seems to be designed to be a little more versatile. I've seen double bevel kiritsuke knives used kind of similar to a gyuto, but can a single bevel edge hold up to heavy cutting board use?


----------



## LifeByA1000Cuts (Mar 20, 2017)

And funayukis, and more old-school deba types too....

And even when they are awkward to use, some of us won't stop practicing until we CAN use them the way we thought we could ....


----------



## b2kk258 (Mar 20, 2017)

I have a few debas, yangis, and usubas but outside of work...I never use them. I would say they're pretty useless in that regards.

Edit, I use my honesuki a lot. That knife is so useful for breaking down chickens and I don't have to worry about chipping compaired to my petty.


----------



## Jovidah (Mar 20, 2017)

...but a honesuki is (usually) not a single-bevel knife. It might be very assymetric, but it's very different from yanagis, debas, etc.
Also, a kiritsuke is basically a mix of a yanagi and a usuaba. But a single bevel kiritsuke is a very different beast from the kiritsuke-shaped double bevel gyutos that have been popping up recently.


----------



## StonedEdge (Mar 20, 2017)

Jovidah said:


> ...but a honesuki is (usually) not a single-bevel knife. It might be very assymetric, but it's very different from yanagis, debas, etc.
> Also, a kiritsuke is basically a mix of a yanagi and a usuaba. But a single bevel kiritsuke is a very different beast from the kiritsuke-shaped double bevel gyutos that have been popping up recently.



You're right in that it doesn't have an ura back side. But for all intents and purposes I tend to group these into the single bevel category because of its wide bevel and non-existent edge on the back side, its only deburred. Technically though you're 100% right.


----------



## TimoNieminen (Mar 20, 2017)

_PixelNinja said:


> Single bevel knives excel at what they are designed for  outside of their intended purpose, the pretty much suck.



Knives designed for a specific purpose are often poor for other tasks. But there are plenty of general-purpose single-bevel knives (e.g., single-bevel santoku). Being single-bevel doesn't make a knife specialised - deba, yanagiba, and usuba are specialised knives that happen to be single-bevel.

Single-bevel knives aren't just a Japanese thing; they're also common in the Philippines:


----------



## daveb (Mar 20, 2017)

Don't run with that


----------



## _PixelNinja (Mar 21, 2017)

TimoNieminen said:


> Knives designed for a specific purpose are often poor for other tasks. But there are plenty of general-purpose single-bevel knives (e.g., single-bevel santoku). Being single-bevel doesn't make a knife specialised - deba, yanagiba, and usuba are specialised knives that happen to be single-bevel.
> 
> Single-bevel knives aren't just a Japanese thing; they're also common in the Philippines:



I was referring to traditional Japanese single bevel cooking knives, of course  which are specialized by design. The cebu and talibong you show don't really compare to those (I am half Filipino  ).


----------



## Jovidah (Mar 21, 2017)

Maybe they're designed for thinly slicing opponents?


----------



## DaveInMesa (Mar 21, 2017)

daveb said:


> Don't run with that


 :laughat:


Jovidah said:


> Maybe they're designed for thinly slicing opponents?


 irate1::rofl2:


----------



## TimoNieminen (Mar 23, 2017)

_PixelNinja said:


> I was referring to traditional Japanese single bevel cooking knives, of course  which are specialized by design.



.. except for the GP ones, like the kiritsuke, single-bevel bunka, santoku, etc.


----------



## Customfan (Mar 23, 2017)

I use my yanagiba's quite a bit (slicing protein, sashimi, maki's, etc.) my deba's quite a bit as well, particularly a Masamoto KS? Or KA? Don't remember... (Breaking down fish and poultry), my usuba (Suisin) not so much (creating daikon and cucumber sheets) for maki sushi rolls for instance. 

Thats as far as I'll go, no traditional kiritsuke, etc. would like to try one just for kicks....

So maybe i'm the exception but I do find them quite useful. I make some substitutions, yanagi for suji for instance just to keep things interesting. :wink::angel2:


----------



## LifeByA1000Cuts (Mar 24, 2017)

I still think I wasn't totally mistaken that debas give you a good feel when dealing with veg for raw (or very crunchy) consumption - if you wedge a deba in the cut you are doing, you are probably doing a cut that will wedge the eater....


----------



## _PixelNinja (Mar 24, 2017)

TimoNieminen said:


> .. except for the GP ones, like the kiritsuke, single-bevel bunka, santoku, etc.


You will find that experienced cooks or people like Jon will tell you that knives such as the _kiritsuke_, while multipurpose, do not excel at the tasks the source blades (here an _usuba_ and _yanagiba_) were intended for. As for the single beveled _bunka_, _santoku_ or _gyuto_ we see pop up here and there; they are prototypes at best  they suck compared their double beveled counterparts.


----------



## TimoNieminen (Mar 24, 2017)

I've seen the claim that the kiritsuke is a hybrid yanagiba-usuba, but haven't seen any evidence for this claim. The historical question of the origin was asked here before, but IIRC, while many people commented on how multi/all-purpose the kiritsuke is or isn't, there was a lack of answers to the historical question. How old is the kiritsuke design?

I had a single-bevel santoku for a while. It wasn't very good, but that's because it was mediocre steel and European-soft - the single-bevelness wasn't a problem. If it had been blue 2, it wouldn't have sucked compared to its blue 2 double-bevel replacement.



_PixelNinja said:


> You will find that experienced cooks or people like Jon will tell you that knives such as the _kiritsuke_, while multipurpose, do not excel at the tasks the source blades (here an _usuba_ and _yanagiba_) were intended for.



Unsurprising that a general purpose knife isn't as good as specialised knives for their tasks.

Not sure what your point is. My points were just that (a) there are general purpose single-bevel knives, and (b) usuba, yanagiba, deba aren't specialised knives because they're single-bevel, but because of other features of their designs. Not that general purpose single-bevels knives are awesomely good, or better than general purpose double-bevel knives, or similar claims.


----------



## jklip13 (Mar 24, 2017)

For me the Kiritsuke is much more of a large usuba with a more versatile tip, rather than a slicing knife like a Yanagiba.


----------



## JBroida (Mar 24, 2017)

TimoNieminen said:


> I've seen the claim that the kiritsuke is a hybrid yanagiba-usuba, but haven't seen any evidence for this claim. The historical question of the origin was asked here before, but IIRC, while many people commented on how multi/all-purpose the kiritsuke is or isn't, there was a lack of answers to the historical question. How old is the kiritsuke design?
> 
> I had a single-bevel santoku for a while. It wasn't very good, but that's because it was mediocre steel and European-soft - the single-bevelness wasn't a problem. If it had been blue 2, it wouldn't have sucked compared to its blue 2 double-bevel replacement.
> 
> ...



it's not so much evidence of the claim but rather that is specifically what the knife makers say about kiritsuke... it is designed to combine what one can do with both an usuba and yanagiba (though not as well as either, of course). The kiritsuke design is not really that old at all... but most of the knife shapes we see today aren't that old, to be honest. Some shapes date back just a couple hundred years, while others are slightly older than that, but nothing is really that old. A lot of the shapes we see today are from towards the end of the Edo period... I feel like many people just assume they are much older than that. Some of the older shapes are crazy though. When I was in college, I wrote a thesis that covered some topics of Japanese food. In my research, I came across many older shapes and styles of knives. Deba closely resembles some, but there was much greater variety and the cross-sectional geometries were different. The Meiji jidai was when you started to see many of these things become more codified, as well as when many of the modern double bevel shapes and styles began to be made.


----------



## valgard (Mar 25, 2017)

JBroida said:


> it's not so much evidence of the claim but rather that is specifically what the knife makers say about kiritsuke... it is designed to combine what one can do with both an usuba and yanagiba (though not as well as either, of course). The kiritsuke design is not really that old at all... but most of the knife shapes we see today aren't that old, to be honest. Some shapes date back just a couple hundred years, while others are slightly older than that, but nothing is really that old. A lot of the shapes we see today are from towards the end of the Edo period... I feel like many people just assume they are much older than that. Some of the older shapes are crazy though. When I was in college, I wrote a thesis that covered some topics of Japanese food. In my research, I came across many older shapes and styles of knives. Deba closely resembles some, but there was much greater variety and the cross-sectional geometries were different. The Meiji jidai was when you started to see many of these things become more codified, as well as when many of the modern double bevel shapes and styles began to be made.



That's some cool info, thx for sharing.


----------



## Customfan (Mar 25, 2017)

That was very informative, thank's Jon!

Is there a reference or source to go to learn more about the evolution?


----------



## JBroida (Mar 25, 2017)

Customfan said:


> That was very informative, thank's Jon!
> 
> Is there a reference or source to go to learn more about the evolution?



there are a few books in japanese that i spent time working with, but not a lot in english... there were one or two, but i cant remember the names off the top of my head


----------



## TimoNieminen (Mar 25, 2017)

If the kiritsuke is a recent enough invention so that we know who invented it, and we know that's what they said about the invention, then it's fact, and we know it's fact. If it's a few generations old, and the inventor's identity is lost in the mists of time, then it's speculation. Just because the speculation is accepted and passed on by knife makers doesn't make it correct - just try asking martial artists about the history of martial arts and see what kind of myths they try to feed you (I think knife makers will be much more reliable than martial artists, but still not to be automatically trusted on points of history).

A lot of Japanese cuisine as we know it today is quite recent. Lots of change in what people have been eating in Japan over the last century and a half, so no surprise to see a lot of evolution in knives.


----------



## Salty dog (Mar 25, 2017)

If I have to break down whole chickens or ducks I'll break out the deba. I find the sharp sturdy edge very useful and the beveled side works well separating meat from the bone. The beef of the blade is good for manipulating the bird and "breaking" the joints.

I find the yani design allows for length and little to no flexibility which I find useful in cutting large proteins. Not my first choice but have no problem using one of the big ones.


----------



## LifeByA1000Cuts (Mar 25, 2017)

Would still love to know even in what year the now-common white and blue steels were formalized....


----------



## jklip13 (Mar 25, 2017)

LifeByA1000Cuts said:


> Would still love to know even in what year the now-common white and blue steels were formalized....



I will need someone to chime in with specifics but I believe it was Iwasaki working as a consultant for Hitachi that helped come up with those steels


----------



## panda (Mar 25, 2017)

no wonder iwasaki steel is so good, he's the source!


----------

