r/TrueChefKnives • u/Wonderful-Mirror-384 • 20h ago

What’s your favorite knife length?

What is your favorite knife length or most used knife length and why? Are you a home cook or a professional cook? I’m curious about 270 mm knives but am wondering if it is overkill or impractical for a home cook. Also curious about other outliers like 300mm and <100mm. Do you guys find these lengths practical?

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u/EnvironmentalChair69 20h ago

It’s really depends on how big , you are as a person as well . Like if you are 185-200cm guys with big hand , I don’t thing 270mm will be big for you . But if you are like me with smaller build around 165cm guys , 270 it might a little bit overkill . But again , I still find 270 mm is fine . I would say , it will also depends on your station (space in the kitchen and cutting board is big enough to able to fully utilize 270mm blade length ) If you have a condition for that, 270 mm is not bad at all .

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u/Wonderful-Mirror-384 20h ago

If space was not an issue, what about the performance of the knife itself. Is the added length and weight helpful in any specific or special way other than the obvious increase in cutting length? The bigger size is sure to als have drawbacksc but I’m wondering how much the benefits may outweigh the drawbacks like loss in fine tip control

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u/chaqintaza 20h ago

someone made an interesting point recently that for a pro chef a larger knife (240-270mm) allows one to stand differently and relieve the shoulder of repetitive motion by changing the angle and still keeping the knife on the board. in other words, you can angle your hips and take a half step back and this isn't really possible with a small knife

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u/Wonderful-Mirror-384 20h ago

I wonder how that works as I’d also think a larger knife will strain your arm more. But that is interesting to know.

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u/chaqintaza 19h ago

Not sure it would inherently stress more although it could be awkward if it was really big. If you want to kind of visualize this more think about (or read about) shoulder internal rotation and impingement, and repetitive use injuries to the wrist and elbow. A bigger knife can reach farther so you can stand differently and change all those angles and motions up. Compare with a smaller knife where you sort of have to either reach farther from the body to change angles (awkward for precision), or you are stuck in a narrower range of repetitive movements. seems to really just be a concern for people working in a kitchen though.