Misono Sweedish Steel Review

Misono 300mm Swedish steel sujihiki w/ Dragon

Price: $190
Length: 300mm
Height @ spine: 40mm
Width @ spine: 2.5mm
Width @ choil: 1.5mm

Weight: 240g
Blade material: High-Carbon Swedish Steel
Blade finish: matte
Balance: at bolster
Hardness: HRc 60
Handle type: Western
Handle material: Pakka wood

Scores:

Performance: 9
Usability: 4 (very reactive!)
Ergonomics: 9
OOTB Sharpness: 10
Edge profile: 9
Blade fit & finish: 8
Handle fit & finish: 7
Quality Control: 8
"Wow" Factor: 9
Value: 8

Overall: 81

The knife has a dragon on it! I'm not sure that it's even worth commenting on the knife any further. It's got a dragon!

Okay, so the dragon is very cool. And it's probably the first thing you'll notice when your friend starts waving it around. The second thing is that it looks like short sword ready for a hobbit — it's pretty long for a kitchen knife. For a slicer, I think that's unadulterated goodness — I want to be able to take the blade all the way through a hunk of beef (steak, loin, roast) all in one stroke, and 12" seems like a good size for this.

So, let's talk about the dragon. Did I mention that it's cool? Not in the sense that your significant other is going to swoon or anything — and in fact, she might look askance at it and at you, and then start wondering where your "secret" comic book collection is. No matter, she'll never find them, right? And the knife has a dragon!

The engraving is pretty simple, very shallow and filled with laminated ink. Looks great new, but I have no confidence that it has staying power. Take that as a word of caution — when cleaning this knife, keep harsh cleansers off of the engraving. For what its worth, special order engravings on knives from artisan smiths like Watanabe are all hand-etched — this Misono obviously isn't in that class. On the flip side, this Misono costs about as much as the engraving alone does on a Watanabe, even before the cost of the knife it's engraved on is considered, so I'm not sure it's that's worth dinging it for.

Before I go further, I have to talk about the steel. It's Swedish steel, not Japanese or German. Does that matter? Not exactly, but I call attention to it because it's unlikely that you have any knives with this kind of steel, and therefore, you should expect it to behave differently from your other knives. How? Reactivity. Yes, this is a carbon knife, not stainless. Unlike other carbon knives that may rust on you if they're handled poorly, this Misono is going to rust on you, whatever you do. And that's the point I need to make — this knife steel is wildly reactive beyond any knife steel I have ever owned or even read about. That gorgeous look the knife has coming out of the box is going away with the first cut you make, whether its an onion or a fillet.

Out of the box, the steel has a very slight odor — use it, and that odor gets a bit stronger before fading entirely. Don't worry, its just your knife rusting on you. One slice through a flank steak and the steel in contact with those juices discolored on me. Just like that. One cut, and I could actually watch it rust. I wiped, dried it off, stored it, came back later that night and it had a very light brown sheen to it — active rust. From steak. Eeek!

What a knife like this needs is a patina, a protective coating that keeps the reactivity to a minimum. Patinas are harmless to the knife and the food it cuts, and can be quite attractive, developing a beautiful gasoline-on-water pattern of brilliant blues. They develop naturally over time, and they can be quite startlingly beautiful. Unfortunately, you're going to have to be really militant about caring for this steel while you're working on that as it is just as likely to develop a very unwelcome brownish-reddish-orange mottling folded into the blue — again, active rust.

At this point, I've had the knife for a month. I admit, its not a knife style that I use much, but over the last couple of weeks, I created about a dozen excuses to do so; each time, I was meticulous in keeping it clean and dry. Early on, I tried to "force" a patina on the knife by slicing up some onions, wiping the knife dry and spraying camellia oil on it before putting it away. While it did develop a patina, it wasn't complete and the knife is was covered in rust spots along its entire length. I've had to take my Super Eraser to it several times — the last time, I ended up scrubbing the entire blade to remove the wild profusion of rust spots. Don't have a Super Eraser? Get one. But be careful — while it removes rust quite effectively, it also scratches up the blade ....

So, moral of the story: be vigilant. This knife will take more care than most, so if that's not okay, or you don't feel up to it, select another product line.

Which would be a shame, because in just about ever other respect, this is an amazing knife. The balance on this foot-long slicer is perfect — exactly under your index finger when you hold it in a pinch grip — that is, right at the bolster — which makes this a very easy knife to manipulate. The knife is about 50 grams heavier than the slightly longer Takeda, but I'm not sure why. Maybe the full tang and riveted handle? The blade is thin with a very slight distal taper. The edge thins out very gradually from the spine down to a slight, 1mm bevel along the edge. The edge itself is hair-popping sharp, and one of the sharpest edges out of the box that I've seen. At HRC 60, the steel is very amenable to sharpening, and after a round on the stones, the tiny cutting bevel comes back fast. I have to be honest here — after only a month's use, putting this knife on stones was totally superfluous as the edge was still perfect. Still, after a quick touch up on a 5,000 and then a 10,000 grit Naniwa Chosera, the edge was every bit as scary as it was when I started — only better. The blade flexes a bit with use, and at this length, that's hardly surprising. However, the flex is just that — flex — as the knife easily comes back to true. Unlike my Takeda.

The handle has an integrated bolster, so the transition from blade to handle is smooth and seamless. Rivets are plain brass, I think. The handle is a non-descript composite wood that has been impregnated with resin to make it completely impermeable, and it's the same material that Shun uses on all their knives. The handle shape feels nice in the hand. Fit and finish are good and the transitions from handle to tang to handle are all too fine to feel. On the whole, the Tojiro DP series handles are a bit nicer in this regard, but the differences aren't large. Overall, nicer than some, but unremarkable. Good candidate for rehandling? I think so!

All in all, this is a very interesting knife, but I cannot recommend it to a noob or someone uninterested in taking the extra time to maintain their knives. This is most definitely not a throw-it-in-the-drawer-after-use kind of steel, but that said, it's carbon after all. You really need to take more care with carbons anyway, right? Well, the Misono Swedish steel line just needs a bit ... more.

All in all, this is a great knife, and the one slicer I'm keeping. Wish it came with a saya, that the etching was deeper, and that it wasn't so reactive but at this price point, it's hard to argue with the performance of the blade — it comes sharp, stays sharp, and gets sharp with a quickness. And it has a dragon!

v FOR ENTHUSIASTS ONLY

Best regards,

Scot Hull

Misono Sweedish Steel Review

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