There is a lot of bullshit out about knives. Not to be a food centrist (although I really am) but you hear about these 300+ dollar knives or 500 dollar knife sets, or these ultra cheap walmart knives that are “all you need”. These people are constantly at odds with each other, when that simply shouldn’t be the case. I just want to slice for gods sake. 
. Most knife advice you find online will be bad. The people who know the most about knives are not online.
Top suggestion for all knives
If you’re in America, Restaurant Depot is the obvious choice for anything. Post-pandemic, non-restaurant people can come in. This is the place where you can get $1 paring knives and $5 chef’s knives. Many also have a commercial sharpening service in the depot, or nearby, so super cheap sharpening here too. Because the pros can always do it better than you. These are brands that us pro cooks have been using for decades, Dexter probably being the biggest. You can even get a decent Chinese cleaver for $30 bucks. These types of stores will probably have the best deals, but depending on where you are, your mileage may vary. But if you can buy from restaurant supply places, quality and price will always be good enough
If you’re not at RD/Wholesaler
Buy Mercer mostly. I hate to sound like an ad, but Mercer is easily the best mainstream knife brand price wise. They’re not amazing knives, they more just took Victorinox’s place. But Mercers cheapest line are pretty much the standard kitchen knives with minor QOL improvements such as the shape or material of the grip. As far as going cheap, the wholesalers will usually win, but Mercer can at least come close. I used to buy a lot of stuff from China, but the shippers over there usually aren’t willing to ship ANYTHING that could possibly be used as a weapon. Can’t even get food shipped most of the time, a knife is a stretch. They have decent prices on restaurant knives, but you can’t really buy from knives direct from China in the west.
First suggestion is the Mercer Bar/Paring Knife. With a 4 inch blade, they have extra length to cut more. Mercer also uses a copy of Victorinox’s grip design, which is by far the best paring knife grip available. However, Victorinox keeps raising their prices with their relative prestige, so they’re not the move anymore. They’re just Mercer with better QC and higher prices. If you sharpen your own knives at all, Victornox is a scam compared to Mercer. No matter what you buy after this, you NEED a paring knife. Most tools in the kitchen can be replaced with a paring knife, especially peelers.
The second suggestion is a bread knife, and this goes to Mercer again. Separate from price, this is my 2nd favorite bread knife. The 1st goes to a type of bread knife that seems exclusive amongst restaurant cooks. Here’s the Dexter version of this standard restaurant bread knife, but that’s a difference I noticed after thousands of sandwiches. The superior blade of the Mercer knife is a better choice for most people. The scalloped handle on the Dexter is super nice though, makes plating way easier
Main knives
You have a few picks for this. But you need a giant, sharp knife. You can peel a potato with a chef knife, you can replace a paring knife with a chef knife easy, but the opposite doesn’t apply. Try cutting a sweet potato with a paring knife and it’ll probably break
Cheapest suggestion is Dexter knives. You can get them dirt cheap at the right prices, and they’re good enough that you don’t get distracted by them. They also have any form factor you want. There are better knives, but since it’s the same price as bad knives, you shouldn’t buy anything worse than Dexter. However, you need to pick a main form factor for your main knife. You can have all the knives, but I find that people really only need one of these four.
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Classic Gyotos/Chef knives. They’re 8-10 inches, 210-240mm, and what you think of as a cooking knife. They’re good for everybody. If you don’t have the opportunity to experiment, or can’t think of which one of these knives would be most useful, buy one of these. The Mercer chef’s knife is $20.
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Santokus. My personal favorite. These are stubbier knives that still have a point at the end, usually with granton edging on the side to help with being non-stick. These knives were made as fusions between Japanese nakirkis (vegetable knives) and the Chef’s knife. These are the most versatile knife, long enough to cut anything, but also short enough to replace a paring knife in a pinch. The extra thickness over a Nakiri gives durability and versatility
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Chinese Cleavers. These are rectangles of metal with tiny grips on the side that force you to hold the blade. This is probably the most universally used. You can use it as a bench scraper and a million different other minor tools. Extremely useful, but require more education to use to their full potential. They’re big and clunky, and that’s only worth it if you intuitively understand why they’re big and clunky. These things do not break unless you seriously fuck up, you can realistically grind off all the metal before it becomes useless. These knives are more expensive than everything else I’ve listed, but their durability makes them extremely useful. CW: MEAT These are the only knives worth using to chop through bone and other similarly hard things.
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Nakiris. Japanese vegetable knives. Essentially just smaller, thinner chinese cleavers with larger handles. If you’re vegan, skip the cleaver and just go with the Nakiri. Compact, yet still full sized knives best for slicing easy things. Mercer has a cheap one that’s good. However, THESE KNIVES ARE SUPPOSED TO BE PARTICULARLY THIN! These do require some babying to prevent from breaking if you cut anything super hard like sweet potatoes.
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I have a nice paring knife and I literally never use it. I prefer to peel vegis with a Y peeler, and do everything else with a chef’s knife. I don’t even understand what one uses a paring knife for. I think most people probably need a chef’s knife/santoku and that’s it for knives (then get a pair of kitchen scissors before trying other knives).
Also, I would recommend an actual butcher’s cleaver to anyone who wants to chop through bone or similar hard material. Chinese caidao are often called cleavers, but they’re the Chinese equivalent of a chef knife (just as good but take a different skill set, I have a hard time using mine cuz idk how to well). They look similar to cleavers, but they’re more optimized for veg (AFAIK, I’m not like an expert on Chinese knives or anything)
I’m going to show my philistine side here but know that I’m coming at this from a purely pragmatic angle.
Most home cooks do not know how to care for and maintain nice knives. I have seen very nice, expensive knife sets in people’s houses which are completely neglected and because of that they’re about as useless as the cheap knives that you’ll get from a place like Walmart.
If you’re into knives or you’re really into cooking then this advice doesn’t apply to you but if you’re more “just chuck it into the knife drawer with the rest of 'em” than you are inclined to have a knife roll with a regularly-used steel and a whetstone then this is worth considering:
Kiwi brand knives are very popular globally, you can get them from Amazon but there’s a decent chance that you’ll find them in local Asian grocers regardless of which country you’re in.
They are cheap.
They do not have an edge like a professional chef would expect from their tool of the trade (although I’ve been surprised at how many western chefs I’ve come across that use these knives tbh) but that’s, uh, a double-edged sword because that kind of an edge requires a bit of regular maintenance which involves a degree of skill whereas Kiwi knives hold their edge for absolutely ages, even with a level of neglect that would turn most knives from tools to ornaments. They cope well with unskilled attempts at sharpening and those knife sharpener-type gadgets which make chefs and knife enthusiasts shudder.
The handles aren’t as ergonomic as nicer, better designed knives and their QC is a bit lacking so give the knife handle a bit of a once-over to ensure that there’s no play in the tang and, if you’re opting for a wooden handle, make sure that the wood is smooth and free from defects before making a purchase.
The only other downside is that the edge of the knife is slightly flimsy. This is not going to be a problem for 99% of use cases, especially for the home cook, but know that it’s possible to bend the knife at the edge if you really abuse it. But that’s unlikely to happen.
In terms of bang for buck and the best performance for the least maintenance, I think Kiwi knives are really hard to go past especially for an entry-level home cook, for someone on a budget (see above re:santoku knives if you’re only going to buy one knife), or if you’re learning about knife care and you want a very forgiving place to start from.
Because they’re so cheap they’re great for share houses (don’t even get me started on what I’ve had housemates do with my good knives despite all instructions otherwise…), for throwing into a bag if you’re travelling to cook somewhere that’s a bit of an unknown quantity (don’t get me started on turning up to help someone out with catering for a home function and the whole “Okay, so where’s your big knife?” “That is the big knife” discussion or the “Where’s your sharpener?” “…you mean like a pencil sharpener??” discussion [and yes, I have literally resorted to turning a ceramic bowl upside down to use the raw bottom edge as a makeshift whetstone out of sheer desperation/self-preservation before]) or as something to use as a placeholder until you’re ready to invest in something a bit nicer, especially if you’re in a country or a price bracket where you can’t get your hands on the brands suggested above. (A decent sized Kiwi knife in my country costs around $5 - about the same as a 600ml bottle of coke from a convenience store or a vending machine.)
Honestly I think a lot of home cooks could probably settle on a Kiwi knife or maybe a couple of them and be very content with that. (I don’t have a clue if they do bread knives but I tend to make the bread varieties that have tough crusts so I have an expensive knife especially for this purpose - if you’re in a shithole country like mine and you want a bargain priced bread knife that punches well above its weight then all I can offer you is thoughts and prayers, and maybe checking if a nearby chain store “accepts” the five-finger discount I guess?)
I’m willing to face the struggle session which I have brought down upon myself by posting this comment 😬
I bought a Jamie Oliver 3 piece knife set like 8 years ago for $40 ish and I take it to a local kitchen shop to get them sharpened. They’re pretty good, with full tang and hardened steel and a two knife set is available on amazon, which is all you need. 3 piece set has a largeish paring knife which is nice to have.
I hand wash with dish soap and keep them in an old knife block I got at a resale shop.
Checking out the Restaurant Depot page it says nothing about consumers. To get the free membership it wants proof of running a non profit or food venue, and then you have to go in person. How does it work for consumers? Is there something on their page I missed?
Edit: I guess you just go to the front desk and ask for a guest pass. It’s one time use, but seems like you can just go again later and ask for another guest pass.
Yep. Guest passes. L take to come in here to prove something wrong when you’ve never been to the establishment. It’s almost like you should live more, and… oppose book worship
I have no idea what you’re trying to convey here. What little I can discern - I wasn’t trying to disprove anything. I was legitmately asking how it works so I can go check it out.
will probably be a bit before I bother buying any new knives even though mine are absolute dog doodoo from target. But what interests me more is care:
how is acceptable to clean them? (I assume no dishwasher. I do dishwash my current knives though because I hate myself and them)
how often should I expect to have to get them sharpened?
etc
So kitchen snobs will tell you no dishwasher. And there is science to back this up, this isn’t an olive oil thing where it’s based off bullshit, science does truly say not to run your knives through the dishwasher. Also, if you ever buy a carbon steel knife (essentially the cast iron of knives, expensive and actually practical, but with great costs) However, as cooks, we have to run our knives through the dishwasher at minimum of once a day, and that dishwasher would be far more damaging to the blades than your home dishwasher would be. As someone speaking from empirical proof, I’d say that it really doesn’t matter. If you feel more comfortable running your knife through the dishwasher, do it. I personally wash my knife with dawn dish soap, dry it, and put it back in its drawer. However, I will run my knife through the dishwasher pretty much anytime I cut chicken or something similarly dangerous. There is no science behind the dishwasher doing a better job, it just makes me feel better after cutting dangerous things like chicken.
As far as sharpening goes, it really depends. Who’s sharpening? What are they sharpening on? What are you cutting? The typical sharpening tool is the whetstone. I’ll give a TL;DR bit with any of these bits, but I am going to rant for a bit.
First, what are you sharpening on? The pricey, higher quality blocks with less grain options are worth it if you have the money, but the cheapo 4in1 whetstones work just fine and is what I personally keep in my house. When I am sharpening on my own, with a whetstone, however often I feel like. I’ll do as often as once every month, as little as once a year. To be completely safe, I’d say do it twice a year (once every 6 months.) I’ve worked at restaurants that have such a good knife sharpening setup, they will literally use knives as a way to scrape off coagulated grease, those knives scraping against the frier over and over again. They sharpened their knives once a month. Their practices made knives burn out particularly quick too. As long as you do it every once and a while, you’re good, you don’t have to baby your knives. They are not machetes used for hacking through bone, simply thin pieces of metal made to delicately slice things apart, and they’re not commercial tools being used to slice THOUSANDS of onions a day. My restaurant answer is once a month or more, but restaurants use knives infinitely more than you’ll see in your entire lifetime. Unless you’re using your knife as a bone cleaver, 6 months is more than enough for any home cook.
If you’re NOT sharpening them yourself though? It still really depends. Get your knife sharpened once, and look at it afterwards. Does it look pretty much the same? Cool, they used a whetstone! Once or twice a year is plenty. However, if you can see a visible difference in the sheen of your edge, they probably used a motor grinder to sharpen your knife. This technique CAN absolutely shit on whetstones on both sharpness and loss of metal if the sharpener is skilled enough. I even know some people who have bought their own grinders. However, just speaking straight up, I PROMISE you’re not skilled enough with your hands to make the sharpening wheel a good option. It requires the sharpener to match the angles of both sides of the knife by eye. If you can tell someone has used a machine to sharpen your blade, do not go back to them, otherwise they’re running a scam operation. A skilled wheel operator will give you a result that makes whetstone sharpened blades look like shit, And I’m not going to even describe it, these are knives have such a specific look you can tell exactly what happened to them when you see them. They usually have particularly wide and fucked up blade angles. They’re like normal knives made to feel twice as thick when done wrong. Like I said, if you can’t see the difference, the sharpener is doing fine, but if you can look at a knife and know they used a wheel, ask for your money back. If it’s bad enough, most sharpening companies will give you your money back, but will have no documentation on which employee sharpened said knife. It’s not even a crime, but it is victimless.
TL;DR: If you only ever cut vegetables and other similarly soft things, once every 6 months will keep your knife as fresh as it was out of the box. If you use your knife as a bone cleaver, every 3 months, easily cuts your durability in half. Anything past every 3 months is overkill. While I have fun sharpening my knives, enjoying getting the perfect angle on my knife, I know most people don’t. They just want to sharpen their knife and never deal with it again. I’m a cooking nerd and will sharpen my knives every week because I think it’s fun, and it will make my knives marginally sharper to the point I get joy out of it. But unless you WANT to sharpen your knife more, not for a sharper knife, but for the process of actually sharpening it, home cooks should only do 2-4 times a year, and the 4 is if they’re constantly doing butcher work around bones. If you sharpen too much without the skill, there’s even a chance you’re making the knife worse because you don’t understand knife blade angles as much as you should for hardcore sharpening yk?
