Knife skills

Knife care

Kitchen knives need to be sharp, so sharpen regularly.

General advice

While learning unfortunately you will cut yourself. Do not imagine that a blunt knife will be safer; a blunt knife will slide off a rounded surface like a tomato or onion making you more likely to get hurt. You can minimise the amount you cut yourself by paying attention and taking your time - don't hurry and don't get distracted. Eventually you will get enough experience to make cutting yourself a very rare occurrence.

Use the right knife for the job - most vegetable preparation can be done with a larger chef's knife and a paring knife for the more fiddly tasks.

Cut things to the same size or at least thickness; this way, it will all cook to be done at the same time. This is the basis of most food preparation.

Chopping onions

Top and tail the onion and cut vertically in half. Remove skin by hand. Put each half on its flat side, make cuts first horizontally and then vertically pointing towards the onion's base while leaving the base itself intact. Finally, chop in the third dimension (parallel to the base).

Cutting tomatoes

Tomatoes have skins that are hard to cut through with soft flesh underneath; use a serrated knife or a freshly sharpened paring knife.

Chopping carrots

People will tell you that the taste in a carrot changes along its length. This is true, and even more true for chilli peppers which are hottest near the stalk. People will also tell you that because of this, it is best to cut carrots into batons along the length of the carrot to even out the flavour. That may be right for chefs or if you have a very discriminating palette, but in practical terms it is easier to get an even thickness and thus even cooking by cutting into conventional discs. Reserve batons for when serving carrots raw and an even "cooking" result is guaranteed.