As part of my TAFE course we had to provide our own knives. These are the tools of the trade for any chef. You bring your knives to work with you.

So what knives do I own?

About 8 years ago I invested in my first ‘real knife’.  It was a 15cm cooks knife from Mundial.  It’s got a ergonomically shaped handle,  but is quite heavy.  This is still Stephen’s favourite knife to use in our home kitchen, I find the handle a bit too fat, it’s also way past due a sharpening.

A few years later, as a gift my grandma gave me a 10pc knife set from Avanti for Christmas. It came with one of those Christmassy disclaimers ‘if it’s not what you like we can go and change it’. Normally I don’t take up this offer, but Avanti make some of the shortest living kitchen equipment I’ve ever owned. I went along with my grandma to the cooking shop and ended up matching her dollar for dollar and buying a 9 piece knife block from Mundial ($145). Not quite sure which knives to use for which they were more used in order of preference than for any specific task. Using the chef’s knife first and working downwards from there. When it came time for TAFE I packed up my Mundial (5100) Chef’s knife ($60) for classes.

Also on our equipment list we were asked to have:
• Pairing knife
• Bird beak paring knife
• Boning Knife
• Flexible Fish FIlleting Knife
• Serrated Bread Knife
• Crank handled Palette Knife
• Honing Steel

My 3 Chef's knives. Top Ran, Middle Mundial 5100, Bottom Mundial Elegance

For home use you probably only need the Cook’s knife and the pairing knife. Choosing a paring knife is dead simple. Pairing knives are sorts of thing which seem to get tossed out with the veggie scraps way too easily to invest any serious money so buying (several) entry level ones in bright colours is my best advice.

Brands and prices
In Australia a good entry level brand, which most apprentices buy, is Vitorinox. I have 3 of their pairing knives, each of which cost a whopping $4. I also own a flexible filleting knife of theirs ($25.00). Their Cook’s knife will set you back $26. The advantage of these knives is that they’re light weight. The disadvantage is that they’re not a great fit to your hand, the blade doesn’t extend all the way through the handle; making them less durable and the metal used for the blades is poor quality meaning it won’t hold it’s edge and sharpen very well.

For a cook’s knife I advise spending a little more money. When you go a bit higher in price you start seeing two different types of knives. European and Japanese. At a mid-level price range, This is where my Mundial knives sit ($60.00 for the Cook’s knife). These are the knives we have hanging in our kitchen. They’re solidly made and get the job done. On the down side, my knife sharpening guy hates them because of the guard at the end of the blade, but he deals with it! The European knives are generally heavier than the Japanese style ones.

For mid-range Japanese style knives brands such as Furi ($108.00) and Global ($69.00) are worth a try. On Masterchef we had to use Global knives. Their light-weight scared me half to death. I also found the handles a bit small for my hands. Interesting to note is that Furi isn’t actually Japanese, but Australian, with the knives made right here.

Moving up a notch, Wusthof ($190) make some very nice, light-weight European style knives. A fellow chef at TAFE has a full set of Japanese Shun knives but almost exclusively uses his Wusthof for the 40+ hours he spends in the kitchen each work week. The Japanese knives which are popular in this price range are the brands Ran ($260*) and Shun ($170).  For my birthday I was lucky enough to get a Ran Santoku knife and I love it. It’s the perfect shape for my hand, light-weight without feeling flimsy and beautiful. I test drove both the Ran and the Shun and don’t quite remember why I chose one over the other. If you’re not julienning vegetables for 3 hours straight then this level of knife is an indulgence rather than a necessity.

Sharpening & honing
To keep knife slicing smoothly you’ll need to get a honing steel ($68) or a swipe style honer like the Furi Ozitech Diamond Fingers Knife Sharpening System ($30). The advantage of the swipe style is that you don’t have to worry about having the correct angle. These will keep your knife smooth but eventually you’re blade will loose it’s shape will need to put a new edge on it.  Furi make a tool which is fine for mid-range knives (Furi – Tech Edge Pro Sharpener $120) but you might be better off finding out when your butcher is getting their knives sharpened and bringing yours along. My knife guy only charges $5 a knife!

Storage
Knives should never be stored where they can bang around against anything else. Ikea sell great magnetic knife racks ($23) which make grabbing a knife a sinch. If you’re renting and can’t go making holes in walls you could copy what Chef’s do in their knife boxes and get a piece of foam cut to the width of a kitchen draw ($5 @ Clarke Rubber) and cut grooves for your knives. Your third option is to buy a wooden knife block ($53). Although most of these come with a whole lot of knives you probably don’t need, you generally get a steel a pairing knife and a cook’s knife. Sometimes this is the most economical way buy. Alternatively you could sharpen them yourself using a whetstone ($66) and some of these handy guides ($9.95) from Global which ensure you keep the correct angle.

Ran knife with knives in foam insert

Washing
Don’t put your knives through the dishwasher, please. Washing them in hot soapy water and drying them immediately is crucial to keeping your tools in tip-top condition.

Buying
Now that you have a better understanding of what’s available; the next step is to try some out. Grab a few potatoes and head to your nearest knife or cooking shop. Any cooking shop should at least let you handle the knives and many will let you ‘test-drive’ them on a potato.

After your test drive you can smile sweetly and let them know ‘you’ll think about it’, unless the knives are on special. Amazingly buying your knives online is sometimes 40% cheaper. Peters of Kensington, Kitchenware Direct, Your Home Depot and Victorias Basement sell all sell the knives mentioned above $100 less retail outlets such as King of Knives.

All the knives costed above were online price.
“Unfortunately I haven’t been able to find an online supplier who discounts Ran knives.

On a nutrition note, white rice isn’t super healthy so if you want to mix things up a bit you could try using short grain brown rice. You will need to double the liquid and the cooking time. Alternatively, this could be adapted for quinoa. Follow the instruction exactly, in this case.

¾ cup (120ml) vegetable or fish stock
¼ cup (60ml) white wine
1 teaspoon (5g) butter
1 leek finely sliced
½ cup (100g) arborio or carnaroli rice
200g green (raw) prawns
100g frozen peas

Heat the stock and wine in a small saucepan.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, melt the butter and add the leek. Cover the saucepan and sweat the leek over a low heat until soft, stirring occasionally.

Once the leek is soft add in the rice and toast briefly. Add the stock mixture and simmer gently for about 20 minutes.

At this point most of the liquid will have absorbed and the rice will be a little crunchy but nearly done. Add the prawns to the pan and gently stir through the rice. Cover the saucepan and continue to cook gently for 5 minutes. Stir through the peas and cover again. Cook for a further 2 minutes.

Serves 2

We’ve been talking about getting another dog for  a while and were looking at puppies again, but rescuing a dog seemed a much more sensible thing to do. Stephen’s wanted a new ‘toy’ for a while but I wasn’t so convinced. However, when we spotted a border collie at the Lonsdale shelter I agreed to go and meet him. The shelter required that we spend at least 30 minutes with Alex and that we introduced Kevin to him. Alex was a stray and very calm and a bit timid but on meeting Kevin just wanted to play. Too bad Kevin doesn’t play with other dog (yet).

We brought him home and for the first day he was an anxious mess. We went out to the shops and the gym for an hour and left him in the back yard. When we came home he was very excited to see us. So excited, in fact, that he puked all down the leg of Stephen’s jeans and wondered around the house for the next few hours struggling for breath and leaving little pukey-presents on the carpet when he got too excited.

Luckily he’s over that now. Slowly he’s coming out of his shell and we’ve been able to get to know him and start some basic training. Being a stray he didn’t even know his name. He’s also proven to be quite the escape artist. He managed to slip his collar yesterday and chase Kevin into the dam (Kevin has great recall so we let him swim at the end of his playtime). Luckily Stephen showed up and we could combine efforts to catch him. Today I was on my own so I took Kevin to the park for some ball-time and came home to drop Kev in the yard and grab Alex and he was off like the Flash, chasing a walker. The walker took the time to tell Alex to stop jumping but ignored me when I yelled out for him to heard Alex in my direction. 1Km later and back and forth across the main road to Willunga, several times, he finally decided that all he wanted to do was visit the Salopian Inn and then he’d come to me. Sigh. I was planning on taking him on that exact route for his walk. Instead I sprinted it. Nevermind, I gave him a big kiss for finally coming when I called him and we walked home together practicing loose leash walking.

Kevin and I practiced this on the way to the park too. Kevin caught on really quick and the usual drag to the park was really good.

I’ve gone over losts of other YouTube videos and my two favourite channel’s have to be Emily’s Kikopet channel and Zak George’s channel. Both have such fun attitudes to their dogs and the dogs can do some amazing things. I love Kikopet’s channel especially, as it show dogs which are stereotyped as ’stupid’ doing heelwork and other dog sports. So if you think that your dog’s too old to learn new tricks. think again. Give some of Zak and Emiy’s videos a try.

Canned tuna is the biggest selling seafood item in Australia. As supermarkets sell more and more of this profitable product, tuna stocks are in a critical condition. Greenpeace is now putting pressure on supermarkets and consumers to take responsibility for this problem. Overfished species such as Bigeye and Yellowfin Tuna are ending up on Australian supermarket shelves. Greenpeace is encouraging supermarkets to switch to sustainably caught Skipjack Tuna.

And fishing methods introduced to protect dolphins kill endangered turtles and sharks. But consumers would not know this from the label on the can.

Care by knowing what you’re buying…

Read on

My TCM therapist has suggested a two week (yep 14 days) protocol. The aim is to kick my metabolism into overdrive and tell my hypothalamus to get going.

Day 4

Weather: overcast, windy, max of 19ºC
Beach: Maslins Beach (northern end)
Surf: strong and stormy
Time: 8.10-8.20am mission aborted. surf was insane.
Observations: got my butt kicked in the surf too much so I came home and had a cold shower forc10 minutes instead.
RHR: oops
Waking Temp: 35.7 hmmm getting worried. Low again tomorrow and I’ll skip my session

My TCM therapist has suggested a two week (yep 14 days) protocol. The aim is to kick my metabolism into overdrive and tell my hypothalamus to get going.

Day 3

Weather: overcast, windy, max of 19ºC
Beach: Aldinga Beach
Surf: strong and stormy
Time: 12.10-12.30pm
Observations: still didn’t get freezing cold though the water was chilly when I first got in.
RHR: oops
Waking Temp: 35.9 (not enough sleep, due to being out late at Regina Spektor’s show)

My TCM therapist has suggested a two week (yep 14 days) protocol. The aim is to kick my metabolism into overdrive and tell my hypothalamus to get going.

Day 2

Weather: mostly sunny, max of 28ºC
Beach: gym plunge pool
Surf: none
Time: 7.50-8.10am
Observations: not very cold and much more boring
Felt warm again: instantly
RHR: 62 bpm
Waking Temp: 36.2

Beetroot Hummus

Carrot, Zucchini and Parsnip Frittata

Sweet corn and bean enchiladas

Multigrain Waffles

Mini Meatloaves

Tuna & Sweet Potato Cakes

Brocolli Soup with Scallops

Asparagus & Chicken Soup (comp prep friendly!)

Thai Chicken & Vegetable Soup

Black Bean and Pepper Salad Recipe with Cilantro and Lime (Photo above, by Kalyn Denny)

Blueberry Suprise Muffins

Day 1

Weather: sunny, max of 31ºC
Beach: Maslins (a little close to the nude end for my liking)
Surf: small to moderate
Time: 7.50-8.10am
Observations: never got really frozen like last time. Got yelled at by a fisherman for scaring the fish. The surf aggrevared my wrist-go figure.
Felt warm again: within 5 minutes. Except the frozen boob thing.

Might try a different beach tomorrow. Must invetsigate whether the  gym has a plunge pool.

From today on I will try and track my Resting Heart Rate (RHR) and temperature in the morning. I only thought of this while I was standing around in the water. So I missed this morning.

After getting home I thought I’d look further into the science of cold water immersion.

For muscular recover purposes it appears the jury is still out.

There is surprisingly little evidence to either support or condemn cold-water immersion (CWI) after exercise. The logic used to support CWI is usually twofold. First, it helps clear the muscles of waste products such as lactic acid and reduces soreness. Second, the cold reduces the inflammation from the microscopic muscle tears caused by intense exercise.

Unfortunately there is little science to back up either claim. Studies examining the return of muscle metabolites to normal resting levels have shown the recovery time between hot and cold muscles is very similar. A recent French study also cast doubt on the “micro-tear” theory, suggesting the muscle cell walls are not actually damaged by intense exercise.

Source: http://www.australiancyclist.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=8904

This article about metabolic rate seems to come close to the claims I was interested in

Abstract : Several empirical models for predicting the metabolic response to a lowered body temperature have been evaluated against available data of young healthy males immersed in cold water under resisting conditions. Nude immersions took place in 20 and 24 C water for 1 h and clothed immersions took place in 10 and 15 C for 3 h. The data were pooled according to low and high percent body fat (%BF). Decreases in the mean weighted skin temperature (Tsk) ranged from 5.3 to 11.9 C and decreases in the core temperature (Tc) ranged from 0.56 to 1.54 C, while increases in the metabolic rate over the immersion period ranged from 34 to 256 W. Through regression analysis, an inverse relationship between %BF and the metabolic response for a given lowered Tsk and lowered Tc was established. When this relationship was explicitly applied to the models, significant improvements in their predictive capability were found. Variables such as body weight, body surface area and rate of change of Tsk were not found to contribute to the predictive capability of the models.

Source: http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA186914

Another study observed the recovery of sympathetic nervous system of cyclist and concluded

…. that CWI can significantly restore the impaired vagal-related HRV indexes observed after supramaximal exercise. CWI may serve as a simple and effective means to accelerate parasympathetic reactivation during the immediate period following supramaximal exercise.

Source: http://ajpheart.physiology.org/cgi/content/abstract/296/2/H421

Effect of cold water immersion on postexercise parasympathetic reactivation

M. Buchheit,¹ J. J. Peiffer,² C. R. Abbiss,³ and P. B. Laursen³

In this meta-analysis research from other studies was pooled to conclude:

CWI was associated with an increase in heart rate, blood pressure, respiratory minute volume and metabolism. Decreases in end tidal carbon dioxide partial pressure and a decrease in cerebral blood flow were also reported. There was evidence of increases in peripheral catecholamine concentration, oxidative stress and a possible increase in free-radical-species formation. The magnitude of these responses may be attenuated with acclimatisation. CWI induces significant physiological and biochemical changes to the body. Much of this evidence is derived from full body immersions using resting healthy participants. The physiological and biochemical rationale for using short periods of CWI in sports recovery still remains unclear.

Source: http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/44/3/179.abstract

What is the biochemical and physiological rationale for using cold-water immersion in sports recovery? A systematic review

Chris M Bleakley1, Gareth W Davison

Will I be adding this cold water immersion to my regular bag of tricks? Probably. I’m terrible at following through with recovery plans, but Kevin does love a trip to the beach and there is nowhere I feel happier than by the ocean. In July I’ll sure be fortunate that you’re allowed to drive your car right onto the beach. Brrrr.