I really like cooking. I also really like knives. I don't know about these though. For one, he's cutting a bunch of blanks from one sheet. That's no problem, but it seems like he's only offering one kind of steel. For the kind of money he's asking, I'd expect to have a choice of different steels (for choice of flexibility, edge retention maintenance etc.), not to mention handle ergonomics.

There are a lot of things that bother me about "foodies". One is the term. There nothing laudable about enjoying a diverse array of quality foods or being able to afford them. There's an inherent smugness in "foodie" culture that I'm not fond of. Note that I am not saying that people who enjoy their food and drink or want to know more about food and drink are "foodies." I'm talking about people who fetishize food and food related equipment and flaunt those things as badges of personal cool.

From what I've seen, it's not primarily chefs who are buying custom (or in this case, semi-custom) knives. Why? These are not work knives. Simply put, they require too much babying to handle being used for a 12+ hour shift where a menu's worth of food needs to be prepared. Yes, perhaps some name brand executive chefs use their own personal knives to cook when they do cook at their restaurants, but more likely they use working knives.

Note in the video when he talks about the guy who bought a 12" knife from him and he had to repair it after a customer tried to lever out a turkey leg joint. He mentions that he built the knife to cut vegetables, not pry apart joints. However, a chef's knife is supposed to be able to handle a variety of tasks. With it, you should be able to cut vegetables and also break down proteins. It should be able to handle almost anything on a board. It is a very large utility knife. Also, who the hell uses a 12" blade? That's 2 inches longer than the larger end of the standard, with most people tending to prefer the smaller, 8" blade.

Anyway, it's cool to see process stuff. Here's another one on a guy looking for the right steel for his line of tactical knives.