Start by figuring out what kind of knives he likes to use besides the cleaver. Does he want a santoku, which has a flatter blade, more like a cleaver? What size? My father loves a 10" chef's knife with a curved blade and pointy nose, but people with less hand strength prefer 8".

Does he prefer carbon steel, high carbon, etc.? Does he know how to sharpen correctly? Does he prefer thinner with a pointier blade edge? (Japanese) Or heavier with a wider edge angle? (German)

Block sets can be bargains. Anything sold in sets reduces packaging, inventory and shipping costs. But then you have to find the blades you like from one brand in one set.

Do you have a carving set? Do you have a good steel? Whetstones?

Besides the steak knives and cleaver, I'd suggest at a minimum:

One 8" chef's knife or equivalent santoku
One boning knife with a narrow blade
One serrated 5" utility knife
One 4" paring knife
One hollow ground slicer ("hollow ground" is with the oval divots so the blade doesn't stick)

Also, if you don't already have them, carving knife and fork and poultry shears. Those rarely come with block sets, however. Sometimes they do have utility scissors for things like cutting twine or packaging.

Be careful when looking at brands. Some well known brands have very good knives, pretty good knives, and poor, cheap knives. Make sure you know what you're getting. You should be able to get pretty good knives for your budget. Or you might might be able to make your own set by combining a small set of good knives (four basic shapes) with a set of steak knives and a separate block.

I recently did a lot of virtual knife shopping for a thought project and looked at a lot of sets. You can spend the whole budget just on a beautiful block, but I think you can get decent quality for what you want to pay. Look at websites like Sur La Table, and Williams-Sonoma to learn names of manufacturers, then check the makers' websites to learn about their lines and which are the good enough ones. Then shop around. You might get a great bargain on the same knives at Bed, Bath & Beyond, with coupons, or find a sale at Bloomingdale's that beats them all. Just make sure that you're getting the same quality. Usually there'll be a code word that names each line. Skip the ones that are made just for the store unless you have good information that they're suitable for you.

It's a wonderful present!

Buying knives is like buying shoes. Got to try them out first.

Get him a gift certificate and let him pick the knives.

Also, most knife experts will tell you not to buy a set. Only buy the ones you need.

If I was your husband, I want all $700 spent on one single extraordinary show-off knife, instead of a few ordinary knives.

That's just me.

dcarch

I'll take a middle ground.

What is he using now? If it's total garbage and he could stand starting from scratch then I'd probably go for a set. If he's already got some halfway decent knives then I'd be inclined to spend the money on a couple high end individual knives. In that regard, personally I'd probably upgrade my chef's knife and get a sushi knife, even though I've never made sushi. And unfortunately I absolutely agree with dcarch that they're a personal decision.

BUT you asked for recommendations for a decent SET, so I'll throw one out there: Wusthof. I have the Classic line, and last I looked there are a few higher-end lines, where the main difference seems to be the handles. But look for their high carbon blades; don't be bamboozled into buying stamped stainless.

I'd look for useful knives, and I like plllog's list. What does your husband use his cleaver for? If it's for prepping veggies, etc. then I think chances are he's using a thin Chinese style cleaver rather than the fat, heavy, hacking cleaver often found in western sets. If that's the case, then scratch cleaver off your requirements. In fact I say avoid it in general because if he's using it to hack up chickens, etc. then what he has is doing the job and there's really no need for a high end hacking tool.

Well, what I have is what Dcarch said, a bunch of different knives chosen each for its own job (and many of them gifts). They're in a drawer with Messermeister edge guards, and are a motley crew. If the people who buy knives for you know what you like, they do fine. I wasn't happy with the heel of the paring knife I was given (my previous fave got caught in a squash that turned out to be more like a gourd and died it an ignominious death)--now I love it. The heel makes me hold it differently, but I think I have better control this way.

For some people, having a nice matching set sitting attractively in a nice block is as important as the quality of the knives. I made the mistake, at a friend's house, of using the steel in her knife set because the edge of the chef's knife was crooked. It happens! That's what the steel is there for, right? The knife edge bent!!! Like it was made of foil. I'm not that strong, and these weren't fancy dancy hair's breadth Japanese sharpfests. It was just cheapass knives in a pretty block and perhaps they'd also been ground down (never sharpen knives with a machine). I have sympathy for the people who want a pretty set, but don't get the cheap ones!!

And if you can find a set that suits you well enough, you really can get a much better price than choosing one at a time. And if you look around, you should be able to get a good discount or sale price. Don't forget to compare with Amazon.

And please don't think that a "set" must include steak knives, and you need a block to store them. Shop around for steak knives and get sometime you like with your tableware, not something that matches your cooking knives.

I'm not too keen on the idea of a set; much like cookware, there may be some items in the line that just don't work as well, and you may be taking a hit in performance just to get things to match.

("A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." --Emerson)

My recommendations are similar to pllog's above. You can do 95% of all kitchen cutting tasks with just a few well chosen knives-- a 10" chef knife, a 5-6" boning/slicing knife, and several paring knives would handle most tasks, and I then would add a 10 or 12 inch Granton edge slicer.

You can get some pretty cool stuff for knife storage wherein he might store his knife trove. For many years I had a magnetic rack near the stove (see the link). And it worked great at storing the knives safely while having them readily available. This particular model was strong enough to hold a cleaver. Sadly, when our kitchen was remodeled, SWMBO told me that that knife rack wouldn't go in the new kitchen.

I'm a bit of an aficionado of old school stuff; I write with a fountain pen, listen to LP records through a tube amplifier, and use old rustable carbon steel knives. Oh, modern high carbon stainless is very good, but I can get a much sharper edge on old plain non-stainless carbon steel knives. (Julia Child preferred carbon steel to stainless, by the way, so there.) I'll use stainless blades when I'm cutting up onions or citrus, but for most other tasks I'll use carbon steel. (Is his cleaver a rust-prone Chinese cleaver? those are popular in part because you can get them sharp as a razor at home.) To keep my knives in the sharpest condition, I use a paper wheel sharpening system (see Steve Bottorff's web site sharpeningmadeeasy.com for details on that and other sharpening systems). And yesterday was a good day: I found a vintage carbon steel Sabatier at a thrift shop for $1. The same item on eBay was $100.

Just my opinion, of course; YMMV.

Here is a link that might be useful: magnetic knife rack.

This post was edited by arley on Sun, Oct 5, 14 at 20:43

Wow, what wonderful suggestions! You are all a treasure trove of information!

I've found a set on Bed, Bath and Beyond of Wusthoff Classic 20 piece knives in a block for $1000. I do have a coupon for the 20% off.

We have a set of fairly poor quality knives that he's been using for years. You would never imagine he's using lousy knives considering the quality of the food he turns out!, I suspect he'll be thrilled with this set, and I think it's competitively priced.

Thanks again, all. You are so generous with your time and knowledge!

Buying knives is much like buying tools, what works for me isn't going to work for you. More importantly, what feels good in my hand may not feel good in yours. I regularly a 10" chef's knife (Wusthoff Grand Prix), a boning knife (Henkels), and a 4" paring knife (Wusthoff something). We also have a bread knife and one of those "Ginsu" knives which I mostly use hacking apart ribs or cutting bread.

Hand him cash or a gift certificate and let him decide.

I have several mis-matched and various brands of kitchen knives that I love - a huge chef's knife, long and short boning knives, paring and tomato knives, etc.

I bought an empty knife block that also had a slot for kitchen shears and a honing steel.

I stuck all my knives in it, and even had room for a couple of DH's handmade "Mountain Man" knives. I am more than pleased with it.

This was the first time I ever had a "knife block." I got so tired of digging through two different drawers to find "the right knife." Now they are all on the counter, front and center, ready for duty. I can't believe how useful and convenient this block is. Several non-cookers have remarked (with shock) "Your knives don't match!"

No, they don't match; I bought them one at a time as I could afford to get "good" ones. They sure do slice and dice and trim and chop like champions. And I always know where they are.

My knives don't match at all either, and I found a knife a couple of years ago at an estate sale in my neighborhood (there are a lot of those here, as people live here till they die, it seems), and I liked it more than I thought I would until the handle fell apart. It is a Koch Messer Stainless Rostfrei chef's knife, and I liked it because it was very sharp and lightweight. After it started falling apart (brads came off), I taped the handle back together so that I could keep using it because it kept a sharper edge than my Chicago Cutlery 44S Chef's knife, which I've had for maybe 20 years. The Koch Messer knife is smaller and works better for vegetables, especially small ones.

Then yesterday on ATK, they were reviewing vegetable cleavers, and so I watched it because that intrigued me, and I like their equipment reviews a lot more than their recipes or tasting critiques. I am not part of their target audience when it comes to food, but I am when it comes to equipment, and I still like the show, except when they ooh and aah over the food they have just made and when Julia's eyes roll back in her head. I like Bridget much better than I do Julia, and the rest of them are even more annoying. Julia makes good recipes - I just wish she would control her ecstasy a bit when she eats, but that's just me.

Anyway, their choice for a vegetable cleaver was the MAC JU-65 (made in Japan), and so I ordered one on line, as it seems to be the perfect replacement for the Koch Messer, and I think it will be equally light. I have a heavy Chinese meat cleaver that I use when I need to whack through bones, but I never use it for vegetables.

Has anyone else tried this cleaver? - See link below - I ordered it from cutleryandmore.com, which seemed to have the best price.

Lars

Here is a link that might be useful: MAC Japanese vegetable cleaver

J.A. Henckels International "Forged " Premio 18 pc Set
Well made,well balanced,great edge retention when used correctly