Katsushige Anryu Blue 2 Tsuchime Bunka 175mm Stainless Clad Ebony

This line forged by Anryu Hamono really displays what a very experience craftman can bring to you when it comes to knifemaking. It combines the wicked edge that a carbon steel can obtain, the ease of maintenance of the stainless clad and a whole lot of hand forging features that really gives a knife some "soul", all at a very approachable price.

Takumi Ikeda(池田 拓視), the fifth generation blacksmith of Anryu Hamono was trained under the guidance of Katsushige Anryu(安立 勝重). Anryu san has been forging in this industry ever since 1981, and he is still work in the workshop working on some less labour intensive tasks with all of his white hair to this date. That many years of forging have undoubtly given his abundant knowledge that result in knives with amazing performance.

The geometry is something we cannot avoid talking with Anryu's knives, they all have a very thick spine near the handle, thicker than most of the Yanagiba, but this tapers down quickly into a rather thin blade. To obtain this kind of geometry require extensive experience in forging and cannot be done by machine, that means the craftmen at Anryu Hamono put in quite some time to get each of the blade to their desired shape.

The benifit of this intricate geomety and material distribution is better to be felt in hand than told, but to put it in words, a concentrated mass around the pinch grip is that you can move the tip easily will less mass at the end, but at the same time the weight near your hand ensures the blade won't feel like a piece of paper, which increase stability. Long story short, these blades handles like Porsches, nimble but determined and precise.

Matching the mamzing handling is a equally amazing sharpness, the choice of Blue 2 found a good balance in the spectrum of Hitachi Metal carbon steels. It has a superior edge retension compare to the White 2 steel but kept most of the classic carbon steel "Flavour"(edge finess and ease of sharpening) unlike the Blue Super. The Sabre grind and the micro edge allows these blades to penetrate right into the surface and drop through them without much resistance, it is so nice to cut with Anryu knives that I would say the Kireaji(切れ味, Overall feel of cutting) is on par with Yoshikane knives, which are known for their performance.

Anryu Knives are really something that flew under the radars of many people, the amount of time and the level of skill that result them is incredible. This Migaki Tsuchime line offers you a shiny knife with high level of craftmanship, amzing handling and experience and little compromises on maintainability, it is one of the few knives that I would say is being sold for too cheap.