There's a reason why boning knives have that swooped-up tip and vegetable cleavers have a straight edge. The shape of a blade can clue you in to its purpose, and when you factor in its thickness and flexibility, you'll have a pretty good picture of what a knife can do.

The tip

Notice the many types of knife points. Each one has a particular function.

Pronged: Used to spear food, such as a cube of cheese or slice of tomato.

Sheep's foot or snub-nosed: Creates a straight edge right to the tip, but still offers a sharp point for piercing, puncturing, or scoring.

Rounded or blunt: Indicates that the knife isn't meant to pierce or puncture food. Can also be a safety feature.

Spear point: A versatile tip that's good for piercing, puncturing, scoring, and more (such as testing vegetables for doneness, coring fruit, flicking out lemon seeds, stemming greens, opening packages). The shape forces the cutting edge to curve up toward the tip, which allows the blade to rock.

Trailing point: Seen on boning and fillet knives -- separates meat from bone without piercing the flesh.

Blade thickness

All blades are thin along the cutting edge. But look to the thickness of the spine to give you an idea of how tough and how sharp the knife might be. A thick spine makes for a heavier and tougher knife, good for cracking through bones, shells, or very dense vegetables such as butternut squash. A very thin blade makes a lighter, sharper, more flexible knife, which lets you cut thin slices of meat or vegetables. A good guideline: the thinner the knife, the thinner the slice.

Blade length

The length of the blade tells you how much you can do with a single stroke. Long blades cut cleanly through meat or fish and can make quick work of a big pile of spinach. Shorter blades are easier to maneuver when you're peeling something, such as an apple, and they let you cut smaller items on the board more precisely.

Blade flexibility

If you encounter a blade that's flexible, it could be meant to fillet fish or bone meat (the flexibility makes it easier to navigate around bones), or it might be intended to carve a roast or slice a salmon. But flexibility can also be a sign of a cheaply made knife.

Blade width

A wide blade suggests that the knife is meant for on-the-board chopping (the width provides knuckle clearance).

Edge curvature

The curve of the edge can sometimes tell you what cutting motion works best. A blade with a slight belly makes it easier to use a rocking motion while chopping. A straight edge is good for straight down or forward slicing.

Edge type

The cutting edge is either straight or serrated. The edge type can hint at the type of food and the stroke to use. Serrated edges perform best with a sawing motion, and they're often intended for foods with hard crusts and soft, delicate interiors.

From Knives Cooks Love: Selection, Care, Techniques, and Recipes by Sarah Jay, foreward by Chef Emeril Lagasse. Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC.

-- The Nest Editors

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