Transcription
[Music] A chef spends countless hours perfecting a dish only for it to be consumed instantly. There is a bittersweet reality for chefs in this type of environment. I'm here in New York meeting Chef Kane, who is mentored and trained by one of the co-founding chefs of Noma. We discussed the weight-bearing challenges chefs face, what fuels his passion, and how am I going to make him a knife better than his own? Chef Kane has very high standards, and that's why this will be challenging.
Tell me a little bit about your history as being a chef, 'cause you're young. You're a young chef, and you've got a lot more experience than I've met in a lot of people. Tell me about it.
I've been working since I was 15. Started as a dishwasher, worked my way up. And so I got really lucky. Ended up in a two Michelin star restaurant, and somebody had to step up, and so I did. And, um, you know, it was a crazy experience. Like, I was running a two Michelin star restaurant at 22 at the time, and did pop-ups all over the world. Started working with Mads about four years ago, moved to Mexico, and then, um, yeah, I'm back in New York, and I'm the R&D Chef here at illis.
Whenever I'm working next to people, sometimes they feel like it's not, you know, whatever. I'm a very intense individual to work next to, which is, which is okay. Um, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to be everyone's cup of tea. But, um, at the end of the day, whether they understand that or not, it's not my job, you know? Your job is to execute. Yeah. I'm not, and not the coworker, though. Exactly.
And I, and I do have a lot of relatives and friends who ask asked me about wanting to be a chef, culinary school, all this stuff. But what I wanted was, what would be the wisdom you give to people when they say, "Hey, I, I'd like to be a chef"?
I asked somebody whenever I was very young, I was like, "Should I go to culinary school?" They're like, "Why would you pay to learn if you can get paid to learn?" This is 100% the longing. Yeah. And you have to have that endurance, and you're going to be working 60 to 80 hours a week for a very, very, very long time. And you have to ask yourself, do you want that? Because the reality is, is none of these restaurants that are of high caliber can exist without that labor model. Yet the people that always impress me the most are the people that don't say no, are curious, and ask questions, right? Like, you know, you watch *The Bear*, and you're like, "I'm a chef now." Like, quite opposite for me. It gives me PTSD when I watch. I like, I don't watch that show.
Working in a high-caliber restaurant, intensive responsibilities. How is it like carrying that weight, not only inside but outside of the restaurant?
You know, I had a lot of things happen while I was at this restaurant that, like, helped put it in perspective. Giving yourself a little bit of time out of this place to recover, to focus on yourself, your mental health, your physical health, sure. Yeah. Um, you know, your spiritual health, all the, like, it contributes to the betterment of you. Yeah. And it's, it's super important.
Your go-to chef knife. You actually shared a story with me when you first used it.
Yeah. So my go-to chef knife is this giant Katsuk. Um, I got at Horner's chef at Blanca. And, um, I cut the tip of my finger off the first day I used it, and I didn't touch it for an entire week. Scared the hell out of me. It's big, it's heavy, it's, it has a lot of ego, but it's, it's perfectly mean. It's a hefty knife. It looks like it cuts through anything, especially fingers.
Looking forward to making you a knife. So hopefully, the one that I offer you will meet your expectations. Man, I'm slice, push, co, chop, rock, and other styles. Chefs use various techniques based off of what they are cutting, but we prefer certain ones over others. For Chef Kane, it looks like he's a rocker. The edge is always on the board. His knife is a monster. So I'm going to replicate the knife, but fix some opportunities, and hope for the best.
Making Chef Kane's knife is exciting for me because I want to make a blade that has a very aggressive profile. If you notice, the knives he was using, they had that overall look. The steel I'm going to use is sourced from Baker Forge. They excel in Damascus steel with copper embedded in it. My goal as a knife maker is to focus on three things: the shape, the heat treatment, and the edge geometry through grinding very thin.
I'm kind of looking at this, and it's not looking much like a Katsuk. This one's a little bit wider in height, so it kind of looks like a Bunka now. Not that those are terms and knives. Bunkas are a little bit taller and wider. It still has the curvature of a Katsuk, and it has the length. So I think we're going to go with...
[Music] It, then we go.
[Music] Look at that. That's pretty cool. We're now going to temper the blade through cycles, and then onto the grind.
[Music] The buffing machine, aka the Widow Maker, has different types of wheels loaded with compounds to polish materials, making this a death trap by catching whatever is in your hands and flinging it right back to your chest. That's why I take some necessary precautions. Safety first. And although being dangerous, it polishes beautifully.
Finally, the knife is almost complete, and now onto Stonewood. These modified stones help thin the bevels and, of course, polish. If you look carefully, if I put more pressure than what you see, the edge could potentially crack. So I have to trust in my heat treatment, but tread carefully.
[Music] [Music] Finished. We have finished grinding, hand sanding, and buffing this blade. Wait, let me see if I can get out of the way and show you. It is ground very thin. I think we have ourselves a winner. We talked about an aggressive profile for the blade, so when it comes to the handle, all black everything will be the best color scheme.
[Music] Come on, come on, come on, come on.
[Music] And one of the most annoying things are the fittings. Are we even? Are we set? Good. Now we're going to epoxy it, and then we're going to shape it. So I've just tested the fitting, and it looks good. This cheap pinewood is the same dimensions as this handle, so I'm going to cut this up and test it because I really don't know how it's all going to look. Much like a carpenter's perspective, measured twice, cut once. For how simple this is, it actually feels really...
[Music] Comfortable. Putting in the bolster as we speak. We're going to let that set for 12 hours, and then we're going to go on to shaping.
[Music] [Music] [Music] I've got a pretty good feeling about this. We are going to make a three-layer. So what that means is we're going to have one outside sheet, a cutout, and another outside sheet, and we'll fit it. This is the same thickness as the steel, so it should be all flush. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. Okay, definitely not. That was a recipe for a fire. Okay. I'm going to run this through the metal band saw and see if I can do that. No bueno. No bueno.
[Music] Almost.
[Music] Done. We've almost completed the saw. We've drilled in a tapered hole with a tapered pin, so that's more like a friction fit. We're going to glue up the knife, and then see how this all looks together. The most important part in any aspect of knife making is the test. But we're going to go through basic vegetables that really indicate performance. Potato for food release. I'll explain that in a second. Root vegetables, carrots. These are good to tell us how much pressure it takes to push through. A cup. I think this is like the most used vegetable in the world, and it's important to test on an onion, and maybe this garlic that suffers from elephantitis, otherwise known as elephant garlic. All right, let's test. Let's go for potato.
What I love about this is it feels like nothing. I'm actually applying, uh, no pressure. So.
Now to activate our French skills of brunoise.
Oh, this did what it was supposed to do and cut seamlessly. I'm going to clean this up, and then I'm going to do the edge etching. Steel is always fun to see. The way I like to etch is where you darken the steel in acid until you faintly see the cladding. This is where you kind of open up the pores for the next step. You neutralize, and then soak in coffee. We're about four hours in on the edge. Let's just take a quick glance. Woo! Look at that. Going. Let that sit for a little bit longer, but it's done. Now we're going to put everything together and see how it turns out. Pin is in. My hands are a little oily, so you're going to see some fingerprints, but this is it. Now I'm going to take it out. I mean, this is pretty cool. I mean, the copper on this thing is amazing. I'm in love with this handle. I, I'm going to do this with every single knife. Came in with the full intention of making a Katsuk, but what came out of it was a Bunka. I didn't really think about the height making such a difference in the profile, but I think he's going to like it. I am looking forward to delivering this knife, but the question still remains: will he like this knife, and will it cut?
This is the moment where Chef Kane is going to see the knife for the first time. Nervous. I am nervous. I'm nervous. All right, let's make it happen. Open up. Oh my god. Oh, wow. Holy crap. This is f***ing gorgeous, dude. So it turned out to be a Bunka knife. I love it. It's so cool, dude. Yeah, I can't, I can't, I can't let this be here. I have to take it home. Such a unique piece. I don't have any knives like this, like, at all. Like, I wouldn't have expected you to bring me a knife like I have at night, but like, this is so crazy.
This is crazy. This is nuts. It makes the food taste better. This is so dope, dude. Man, thank you so much. You're welcome. A, you're welcome, dude. You're welcome. My pleasure. Such a nice gift. I'm so happy with this, dude. This is so sick.
While getting to know Chef Kane, I witnessed a blend of focus and resilience. His innovative dishes were a testament to his creativity, and yet his candid conversations about the pressures of being a chef reveal the deeper layer. Despite the weight of expectations, his enthusiasm is unwavering. I found his openness about his personal journey and professional challenges deeply admirable. Meeting Chef Kane was an experience in more ways than one.
[Music]