Miyabi Evolution 6.5" Nakiri Knife

The Japanese Nakiri style blade is rapidly increasing in popularity here in the USA. The most traditional style is that of a very plain, rectangular blade that looks very much like a half-height Chinese cleaver, and that's basically what they are, and how they are used. It's a blade that was meant for push cuts and straight up and down chopping, much like a cleaver. Orginally, when building my own knife collection, I was totally uninterested in them, but there are some cool techniques and tricks one can do with a Nakiri that can make them a very handy knife to have around.

I already own a Miyabi Morimoto 600S 3.5" paring knife that I really liked, and thought adding a Miyabi Evolution 7" Nakiri to the collection would be a great move, so I ordered one. However, it was really not what I was expecting...

The knife itself is absolutely beautiful, the fit & finish is first rate, and the handle was almost exactly of the type and kind on my little paring knife--they were a good match of each other. But the Nakiri uses the far better FC61 steel, which holds an excellent edge, and should stay sharp for a nice long time in a home kitchen. The knife was razor sharp right out of the box. It terms of it's looks, quality and performance, there's nothing to complain about.

Yet there were some things about this knife I did not care for in terms of it's design. First of all, though it's advertised as a 6.5" blade, the overall length, from heel to tip, is almost exactly…