About the shape - Santoku means 'Three Virtues' or 'To solve Three Problems'. The three virtues are meat, fish and vegetables, or slicing, dicing and mincing depending on your interpretation. This means that the Santoku is an all-around knife, suitable for the amateur home cook and the professional chef alike. The heigh means good clearance for big hands, while the relatively short blade can be wielded by anyone.

About Hinokuni Sakai - Yukihiro Sakai-san was apprenticed under Nishida-san in Kumamoto, a staunch traditionalist who strictly forge-welds his steel in-house. Sakai-san has learned everything from Nishida-san and continues the traditions of his sensei. Sakai-san recently started his own workshop in Kumamoto making his own knives.

Now he forge-welds everything in house, from hard carbon steel clad with soft steel, and the Shirogami #1 steel used in these knives is forge-welded in house by Sakai-san. This is a very traditional steel that can achieve incredible sharpness and has great edge retention, a favourite of more traditional blacksmiths.

Hinokuni means 'Country of Flame', an oldschool nickname for Kumamoto Prefecturedue to the famous local volcano Mt. Aso.