Misen redesigned their chef’s knife. Thousands of 5 star reviews that the old knife got over
the years including quotes from people like Kenji Alt simply got applied to the new knife
on Misen’s website. So today, I thought we should take a look at the new Misen knife
and see if it deserves the 5 star rating.
In case you’ve been living under the rock the last 5 years, let me go over a brief history
of Misen because it’s not your typical cookware company. If you are already familiar with
Misen, the timestamp for review is in the description below. Misen is an American start-up
that wanted to design an affordable knife with a 15 degree bevel more typical of Japanese
knives, but with the shape that would accommodate the western pinch grip and rocking motion.
They have succeeded admirably. When Kenji Alt from seriouseats.com tried their $65 knife,
he was shocked at how comfortable and sharp it was. He wrote an article about it, which
inspired thousands of Kenji’s fans, like me, to give Misen kickstarter campaign money
to produce this glorious knife. After a year of waiting, I got my knife and never looked
back. My $200 shun is now crying from boredom in my drawer because I never use it. Misen
rapidly expanded into all sorts of cookware with the moto of making luxurious cookware
affordable to everyone.
In 2019, just last year, seriouseats.com reviewed Misen chef’s knife again. Daniel Gritzer
said that Misen handle was “incredibly comfortable to hold,” but out of the box sharpness at
curvature of the edge (in other words closer to the tip) left much to be desired. I heard
about occasional sharpness inconsistencies from other users as well. Not a biggie for
me because I hone and sharpen myself, but it is probably a bigger deal for most people.
Seriouseats said that if out of the box sharpness could be improved, Misen could be their top
pick.
I also noticed that even before the redesign Misen stopped polishing the metal on the handle.
Not a biggie, but not quite what the first shipment of knives was offering.
So that’s the history of the original chef’s knife. The original knife is no more. A few
months ago, it was replaced by the new Misen chef’s knife. Since Misen is the brand I
recommend to my students, I thought I should try the new version to make sure it’s still
worth recommending.
The first change is the width of the blade. The new blade is wider. Misen said that the
wider blade would give your fingers more clearance and prevent you from hitting your knuckles
on the cutting board. That was never an issue for me. I felt like I had plenty of clearance
with the old design. Of course, maybe I am a small handed woman. Maybe for a man with
very large hands, a wider blade is preferable. But given that the original knife was designed
by men and reviewed by thousands of other men including professionals like Kenji Alt
and Daniel Gritzer, I have a feeling that this was a problem for a pretty small fraction
of the population. But if it makes a knife more usable for people with big hands, I am
cool with it. I can use a wide blade or a narrow blade, but they probably can’t use
a more narrow blade.
The next design change is the shape of the back of the blade. This is a huge change in
my opinion. The new knife stops the blade further away from the handle giving you a
more steep arch in the back of the blade. The old knife had the blade come pretty close
to the handle. When I hold the old knife with a pinch grip, the top of my index finger falls
on top of a smooth and wide handle. When I hold the new knife with a pinch grip, I have
to move away from the handle area and more towards the blade area. This fills my hand
with more pointy spine of the knife instead of a comfy, curvy handle.
Now, the top of my index finger falls onto the top of the spine that is narrow and digs
into my skin. And to add insult to injury that spine is as unpolished as ever. So I
am basically holding a fistful of rough metal instead of a smooth handle. I don’t know
if my camera is good enough to show the difference in the finish, but my audio equipment definitely
is. Here is what these knives sound like when I run my nail on their metal.
These are not just my first impressions. I made myself use the new knife for 2 weeks
to see if I could get used to it. I am a creature of habit and it’s possible that any new
knife would feel wrong to me. But after 2 weeks of use, I was still not comfortable
with the new design. I actually ordered 3 other 15 degree knives on amazon to see if
I could find an alternative. I tried Nexus, Tojiro,
and Miyabi. None of them were as comfortable for me as the original Misen. In almost all
Japanese or Japanese style knives, the top of your index finger falls onto the spine
instead of the handle and the new Misen moved more in this direction. Basically, they gave
up the one huge competitive advantage they had over the Japanese knives.
Pretty much all the knives that I found comfortable in my life were designed with the handle extending
over the top of the spine. Here is victorinox -- see how the handle is angled to give you
something wide to press on.
Here is the shun edo -- again see how far the handle comes in?
Unfortunately, this knife is also discontinued. And here is the original misen -- my favorite
knife of all time. These knives aren’t comparable in terms of sharpness. I am just comparing
the comfort of the handle.
I was hoping that maybe smoother metal would solve my problem, but it didn’t. Nexus was
very smooth and it felt great in the hand until I started using it. But once I tried
to dice an onion with it and had to press on top of the skinny spine, no matter how
smooth and polished it was, it was not comfortable.
I know what some of you are thinking. Why are you pressing down Helen? Aren’t these
knives sharp? Sure they are. But even razor blades don’t fall though root vegetables
like air. You do need to push down some. It’s especially noticeable when you are dicing.
When you are slicing, the gliding motion can help you get through the vegetable. But when
you are using the tip of the knife to dice an onion, you can’t really glide the knife
through. Downward force, shouldn’t be the only force, but it’s definitely a force
in chopping and I don’t want a skinny piece of metal digging into my finger when I bring
the knife down.
I notified Misen of my concerns and they told me that the new knife and the old knife were
so similar that keeping both would confuse their customers. According to them the new
knife is better in every way, so that’s the one they kept.
This is where I need your help my dear viewers. If we raise our voices together, I believe
we could bring back the original Misen and ask for better quality assurance, so that
every knife is perfectly sharp from the heel to the tip. To me, that would easily be worth
an extra 20 bucks. What do you think? Here is how to reach Misen on facebook, instagram,
and twitter (all linked below) and please share this video with them. My kids tell me
we need a hashtag. So how about #misenoriginal. And speaking of kids… When my daughter tried
the new knife she said, oh Mom, no. What are we gonna do? And I said, don’t worry kiddo,
we already have a good misen knife, it’s just a bummer that I no longer have a knife
to recommend to my students. And she said, but what about when I go to college? ,
I haven’t thought about that. Well, the good news is that we still have 5 years left.
And I really hope that by the time she leaves home, Misen Original will be back.
You know that story about Julia Child breaking off a piece of a cuisinart food processor
on her show because it was easier to use that way?
And then Cuisinart made that fix for all their future processors. Come Misen, I could be
the next Julia and you could be the next Cuisinart.
Here are more thought provoking culinary videos for you to check out and if you are ever in
the Boston area, maybe I’ll see you in one of my classes.