Mercer Culinary Ultimate White, 8 Inch Chef's Knife

There are people out there with lots of disposable income which results in exposure to lots of things that most of us might never see, do or learn and so, a knife like this one might seem like a trifle to them.For the rest of you, those who, like myself, have lived with stainless steel kitchen sets from the likes of Walmart, Target and Ross for their entire lives. This review is for you.This knife is SCARY SHARP right out of the package. When I first held it in my hands and felt it's balance and gazed upon its highly reflective, high carbon steel surface, I immediately knew that I was on another level. I've been using it daily for several weeks now and, at first, I only noticed subtle differences between it and my old stainless cheap knives, then I realized that I was handling it improperly. I was using it in the same manner as the flawed knives that I had grown accustomed to. I attempted to immitate the actions of chefs and cooks that I had seen on TV and the internet and this knife began to shine. To be sure, I am no chef and I definitely MUST learn proper cutting and chopping technique to get the most out of this knife but the user experience is BEAUTIFUL!I don't feel 100% confident in the hard plastic handle. I worry that if my hands are too wet or maybe oily, there might be a slip, leading to an unfortunate encounter with its unforgiving blade but, the handle isn't bad. It's just chunky enough that I never lose track of it while my hands are in motion and it has raised textured areas for the thumb and forefinger which works really well to help keep the handle stable while in use. Also, and this could be a pro or a con, as I understand it, due to the fact that the blade is high carbon steel and not stainless, you can't let it air dry in the dish rack. It has to be cleaned and dried immediately after every use. As a guy who is used to maintaining and caring for various types of equipment and gear, this is not a problem for me. I appreciate the performance of the knife so much that I WANT to take care of it that way.This knife is obviously not the best chef's knife that money can buy but, for the PRICE, I think it's beautifully made, its frighteningly sharp and for the most part, a joy to use, if you can get beyond the new and unfamiliar fear of cutting yourself (YES. It's that much different from what you find in cheap kitchen sets). It has changed my kitchen experience! I LOVE it and I don't think you'll regret it!By the way, I got this size because my very petite wife has very small hands and she did not want a heavy knife. I will definitely be purchasing it's bigger brother for myself in the near future.

Relatively inexpensive knife. It's made out of a softer steel, but it comes very sharp right out of the package and when I looked at the edge under a 1000x microscope, the edge was beautiful. The handle fits my hand well, and over-all I think it's a well-designed knife. My one nitpick is that the blade is a little bit wider than I would prefer, but that that's probably just me. I slice rather than rocker cut, so I don't need quite that much belly on a knife. I've had good luck with my other Mercer blade, and so far this one seems like another winner, especially considering the low price point.

This is the first ever replacement for our 50+ year stainless steel butcher knife. It shaved the hair off my hubby's forearm. I'll be proceeding with extra awareness & caution. TY appreciatively.

Absolutely love this knife, sharpens like a champ and holds an edge for a long time, the weight is perfect, you don’t need to spend a bunch of money on different knives this is all you need for a whole shift . I’m a sous chef and use it at work everyday, all day.giving it 4 stars because I dropped it 1 time in the middle of a busy dinner and the way it hit the ground caused the metal to spilt in the back of the knife so it can longer be used at work, I’ll be getting a few more incase this happens again!

Sharp and easy to clean. Holds its edge. Easy to use.

Mercer Knifes always hold there own and this is no exception... I really love their higher end VG10 knifes and own a full set of them. The get babied and for chores I don't want to put them through I use the stamped millennial knifes. I own most of then and a few of a couple different versions such as the Nikari that I own 3 of and the 6 inch boning knife 3 as well and 3 of the 8in chefs kinfe..The edges on the higher end knifes are much finer finishes as you would expect but for the low cost the edge is fantastic.What I do when I get a new one is run a 800, 1500, 3000 and 6000 whetstone treatment on it keeping the exact factory bevel (no need to reprofile as the factory bevels are excellent as they are, I will say on the Nikari I do reprofile it to a 11 degree bevel as the thin blade is just so ultra razor sharp with a 11 degree edge over the 15 degree factory edge that it's worth the it if you have a set of DMT or other high quality Diamond stones that I go for it and the steel is hard enough to hold up to a 11 degree angle and keep a edge so long as you are cutting friuts and vegs or slicing tender cuts of meat as the Nikari is intended to do) then over a progressive stropping starting with 3 micron Diamond paste on high quality leather then down to 1 micron to half micron then to .25 micron and finishing with .1 micron.This will give you a edge that will whittle hair even on the thick blades like the 12in chef knife... For most people out the box will be more then good enough as they will shave no problem out the box but I have OCD with sharp knifes and love taking edges to a ultra mirror finish that is literally sharper then a razor blade.At 15 degrees with the method I use on the chefs knifes the edge will hold up extremely with a simple strop on the .1 micron strop after you are finished with it just 5 or so strops per side and that's it and your edge will be flawless (this is how I treat all my knifes). Realistically a home cook could simple strop the knifes once a week even with the factory edge and have razor sharp knifes that don't need to touch a stone for a month or two... If you work edges like I do then the bevel and edge will hold up for an extremely long time with just a few hits on the strop and not need to visit the stones or diamond plates but maybe 2 times a year.The Japanese steel used in these knifes is fantastic and punches way above its price point and holds its edge well but is a little tough to sharpen if you don't have the equipment and or skills to do so... Their German steel knifes are deff easier to sharpen with just a 1k and 3k grit combo whetstone but will not hold a edge near as well as the jap steel will so there is a trade off there.Anyone that's on a budget and needs excellent knifes... Looking further then these is a waste of time. The steel is excellent, the factory edge is excellent, the knifes performance as a whole is excellent.... A 12 to 15 dollar knife that will hold its own with 100 dollar knifes out the package is exactly what these are.They aren't pretty, they aren't flawlessly balanced but they ARE low budget high performance knifes that leaves very very little on the table performance wise versus knifes costing literally 10x...

I'm a retired chef. These knives are SOE (standard operating equipment). These knives are standard commercial kitchen knives. They take a BEATING. Over the years I've acquired many and $200-500.00 upscale crap! I'll put it this way, I cut a couple of fingertips off. Buy cutting gloves, just to be on the safe side. I WOULDN'T USE THEM IF THEY WEREN'T ANY GOOD!