Calphalon Katana Stainless-Steel 8-Piece Knife Set with Block

Pros:
These knives are pretty, with a rounded black handle, and a layered damascus-style blade. This means the blade, while relatively smooth, has a wavy-layered look to it. The Amazon picture is accurate to what you will receive in your set. Out of the box, each knife is quite sharp; enough to shear paper, but not hair.

I have smaller hands, and have some trouble wielding the 8" chef's knife, but find that the 5" Santoku is excellent for chopping vegetables. The 6" utility knife is also very useful for thinly slicing meats. I do use a different paring knife (Pampered Chef) as I find the Katana paring knife a little too sharp and rigid for say, lopping the ends off string beans in my hand. We also made the additional purchase of the 9" bread knife to complete the set. The bamboo block is attractive, and the slots are wide and deep enough to put other wide-bladed/long knives in. However, note that if you get the bread knife, that only leaves 3 empty slots...Read more

Couldn't resist the design, but to try these out first bought the 8" chefs bargain and then fell in love with the feel as well as the look and got the set with the storage block. Plan to expand to what is still missing (esp the honesuki and nikiri)
I find the handles a very comfortable fit, and the blades are so well balanced that I don't find them tiring at all. The parer is a precision instrument, and I love the santoku (both sizes). The sharpener is exactly that: so use with care and keep a honer handy as well for in between touch up. I used the small utility for getting every last bit of meat off of a turkey carcass after Christmas -- think the small honesuki might be even better for this task -- but the utility did a superb job and was easy on the wrists -- I find the short handles make for more finesse in handling and the knife seems to "go" where I want it more easily.
Not everyone will find these to their taste, but I think they are great!

I must say I'm a big fan of Calphalon. I own several pots and pans from both their tri-ply stainless steel and non-stick contemporary series and I love them and highly recommend them.

I bought these knives assuming that their quality in cookware would translate into cutlery. I ended up returning them after several days... here's why.

PROS:
Absolutely beautiful knives that are well crafted with very rigid stainless steel (more rigid than Henckels and Wustof). The Santoku knife is a nice addition. I loved that the steel construction went all the way to the end of the handle. The steel provided with the set supposedly actually SHARPENS the knives as opposed to only HONING them. Who knows.

CONS:
1. Very heavy. Compared to the German knives, these are not agile at all and can be painful on the wrists especially when using the very substantive chef's knife. I thought the weight would add to the cutting ease but it really did not...Read more