Are ceramic knives a good buy for the home?

Home & Living
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Ceramic knives have been around for a while now so aside from the benefits claimed by vendors there ought to be some real experience in our membership of both chefs and cooks. The question is do they live up to the general promises, are they only suited for some purposes or are they a fad that will pass and can be ignored?

The promises:

  • Sharp
  • Long lasting
  • Lightweight, which reduces fatigue and accidents
  • Moderate price

Before I say too much I would like to hear about the experiences of members who have used ceramic knives. We may digress into what the web or social media says but let us start with personal reports.

What is your use of one?
Does it meet the promises?
Are there other benefits?
Are there disadvantages that vendors may not mention?

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Sharpening. While they claim that the sharp edge has a long life, they do dull over time. Sharpening them isn’t as easy as a traditional steel knife. Generally they require a diamond sharpening stone (which are quite expensive) and care must be taken to ensure one doesn’t break the blade off them exerting pressure on the side of the blade.

We had one that dullled after about 18 months of use. We tried sharpening with a traditional stone sharping block and the edge couldn’t be sharpened all that well. We investigated how to sharpen (see above) and found it was expensive to buy a special diamond sharpening block (at the time it was about $70 for a special sharpening stone when the ceramic knife cost far less than this when new).

The knife ended up going in the bin and we replaced it with a Anolon carbon stainless steel knife. The Anolon knife needs sharpening every few months (maybe 2-4 months depending on use) and takes about 2-3 minutes using a pocket stone
to get a razor sharp edge on it. We have also had the existing knife for 10+ years and still going strong.

Would I buy another ceramic knife, no. It performed well when sharp
but I don’t believe the cost outweighs the potential benefits (and also waste if they dull and one choses not to have it resharpened).

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Second that. My experience is underwhelming. Metal blades are far easier to maintain.

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Does anybody know if there is a way to reliably sharpen a ceramic blade? As mentioned you need to have a diamond dust ‘stone’ or hone as the blade material is too hard for carborundum and other common stones.

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I have ceramic knives in my rotation and I find myself using them less and less as I prefer the “weight” of steel knives for my day-to-day cooking. I think the only benefit of the ceramic knives for me is that they are easier to wash?

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An odd thing (which may be just an idiosyncrasy) is they don’t seem to work as well on meat, especially gristle and sinew. When sharp the knife gives are very neat and reproducible cut for vegetables but on meat it leaves threads and needs a second cut to get through too often. I’ll leave this as it may not be a common problem.

A common problem that the vendors do not emphasize is how brittle and fragile these tools are.

  • You cannot put much weight on them or they will break. So no cutting pumpkins etc
  • You can chip the blade by putting something with a little weight on top of it, such as a metal saucepan or a platter, or by dropping it.
  • The size of the blade and hence the function is limited.
  • The brittleness of the blade is a serious problem for sharpening.

Speaking of sharpening, yes they do need to be sharpened, any claims that they do not need to be sharpened is wrong. They do keep an edge quite well but (depending on your use) they will get noticeably blunt after a year or two and then you have a problem.

As mentioned the material is very hard and you are wasting your time trying to sharpen it unless you have a diamond stone or rod. Diamond sharpening accessories are much cheaper these days, I bought a set of three stones (100, 200, 400 grit) for $15 and another (1000 grit) for $11. So DIY sharpening is not immediately out of the question. The problem is that due to the brittleness of the material the coarser stones produce a very poor edge as the diamond dust just tears bits out of the blade. Very careful use of the 1000 stone gives some improvement but not back to factory sharpness. You can get finer stones but I didn’t bother. Of course the finer the stone the longer it takes to sharpen.

You can send the knife back to the maker to be sharpened at some cost or you can buy a sharpener from them. If anybody has tried the latter I would like to know how it worked. There is an odd internet clique who just love knives and spend their time swapping tips on how to get your blade sharp enough to emasculate a gnat at twenty paces. They are divided about ceramic sharpening. Some say you can others you can’t and some say you can but you must go to too much trouble and it isn’t worth it. From my experience it looks like the last is true.

My summary is that the limitations exceed the benefits. You are better off getting medium-good steel knives and learning how to sharpen them yourself not hoping your new ceramic will stay sharp for ever.

Of the original promises some are true others only somewhat.

  • Sharp [for a while]
  • Long lasting [not really]
  • Lightweight, which reduces fatigue and accidents [true but there are other solutions]
  • Moderate price [true but so is a quite acceptable steel knife]
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We had a ceramic paring knife which became dull after half a year. I tried to sharpen it in the ‘ceramic’ section of our pull through knife sharpener. It has a V profile for sharpening steel and one for ceramic, and in the middle a slot for scissors. Therefore, I assumed it was designed for ceramic knives.

First pull through resulted in chips breaking off the cutting edge, and the very tip snapping off. To make matters worse, the blade wasn’t any sharper. It got relegated to the garage.

I wouldn’t buy a ceramic knife again.

  • Sharp - only when you buy it.
  • Long lasting - depends on how much you use it. It’s much more fragile than a steel knife, so don’t flex the blade or it will shatter.
  • Lightweight, which reduces fatigue and accidents - I haven’t weighed it, but it doesn’t seem any lighter than a comparable steel knife. Sharp knives reduce accidents, and these aren’t sharpened as readily and easily as a steel knife. If you are using a knife for long enough to get fatigued, you will be better off with a quality steel knife that can be sharpened ‘as you go’.
  • Moderate price - I don’t think the one I bought was cheaper than a steel knife
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Everyrthing I’ve heard indicates that they’re an over-elaborate idea.

I am the cook in our home, leaving aside soups which is my wife’s thing.

And, I’m the carver for when we have roasts - poultry or red meat. I have long ago come to the view that a leg or shoulder of lamb is best boned for us by our butcher. Cameron, down at Kambah Village! He is willingto bone stuff for me and I bring down a jar of the relvant marinade for us to put itnto the boned joint. Before he tighs it up.

Whether this is due to his trying out my lamb or beef marinades, I’m not certain.

This is usually only for a total of 5 or more diners. For Birthdays and Xmas we ofte have 10 or more guests. Usually out under the Long and deep North-side deck

Keeping steel knives sharp is not hard, once you accept that there’s just one right way.

All of which reminds me!!! We are having French Herbed Chicken to night as per the Women’s Weekly’s Cook-books.

You have to separate the skin on top of the chicken from the breast and thighs with an overturned table-spoon - NB without breaking / tearing the chicken’s skin. You then make a soft marinade from french mustard, butter, oregano and crushed garlic, plus a little olive oil, and one lemon’s juice.
And then, push the gooey mass in under the skin and down over the thighs.

I’ve given up on making stuffing and putting it in the chicken, but I do quarter an onion and stick that inside.

So popular is this method that I often have to supply a roast chicken and a red-meat roast.

Lamb does respond well to a garlic, oregano and oil mix - in the blender and some smoothed in under the skin of the leg or shoulder. The joint then covered with the rest of the marinade.

Even in Winter, I prefer to cook roasts, for several people - in the large (60CM) charcoal-fuelled Weber.

Canberra isn’t all that cold!!!

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I have a cheap Aldi ceramic paring knife which cost about $7 from memory. It is very sharp and came with a blade cover.
I don’t use it often as I have other paring knives which do a good job.
Where the ceramic one comes into its own though, is for scoring pork rind on a pork roast.
Previously I struggled with this, even with a filet knife, but the ceramic knife cuts through it like butter.
I didn’t realise that ceramic blades get blunt easily but I am happy to keep mine just for this purpose.

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For scoring pork use a Stanley Knife. The advantage here is that a packet of blades are very cheap and easy to replace. We used this method in our restaurants for years.

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Great idea, Thanks!!!

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Ceranic knives?

How about wooden knives?

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The linked product:

  • does not seem to be available commercially,
  • no price is mentioned,
  • gives no information at all about home sharpening, or any sharpening,
  • is not about sharp knives at all.

can be nearly 3 times sharper than most commercial table knives

(italics added)

Fred, when you find some new bit of interesting technology in early development at the moment you start a new thread or find one to graft it on to even if it doesn’t fit. Why not have a running thread that you add all these to as they come up? This provides a place to look for those who are interested and avoids diluting others where it isn’t relevant.