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A retired butcher in Tulsa showed me his knife roll and I felt like a rookie again
I was at a meat cutter meetup in Tulsa about 3 weeks ago and this older guy named Ray let me look through his knife roll. He had maybe 9 knives total, all of them beat to hell with taped handles, and he told me he's been breaking down whole beef for 35 years with basically 3 of them. I've got about 14 knives in my kit and I realized I don't actually know any of them that well. Started leaving half of them at home the next week and my breakdown time on a whole ribeye actually got faster, around 4 minutes less per primal. So my question for you all is how many knives do you actually carry on a normal shift, and do you switch them up by the cut or just stick with your main one?
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riley51729d ago
That line about not actually knowing any of your knives that well really hits, because it shows up everywhere, not just in a meat room. People buy 40 guitar pedals and can't play a single one well, cooks carry 6 spatulas and still grab the same one, golfers have a full bag and only trust 3 clubs. There's this weird thing where more tools feels like more skill, but it's really just more choices slowing you down. Ray broke down whole beef for 35 years with 3 knives because those 3 became part of his hands, and you can't get there if you're splitting your time across 14. Sounds like leaving half at home was less about the knives and more about finally learning the ones you kept.
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