Yes. Here's the thinking behind this design: Rather than just have a squared-off, straight chopper, I was hoping to make some subtle changes to the traditional cleaver design to make it just a tad bit more functional. To that end, the edges were rounded to allow a sort of a belly in the blade for skinning. When used with what the chef's call a pinch grip, you can get some fine work, such as skinning or even rocking on a cutting board back and forth (think slicing onions or celery). Maybe not like an real ulu or a real skinner, but it should be a bit more accommodating for those tasks. You don't really lose any chopping potential by rounding it off, and you do gain a curved edge with which to work with, albeit a small one. My goal was to create something that can be used to do an adequate job of just about everything, rather than a very specific tool for one thing. I started with this goal: A knife that can gut, skin, quarter, hack through bone, and otherwise butcher an elk. Then chop down a tree, baton through large and small pieces of wood to build the fire to roast the elk. As we all know, certain knives do better than others at different tasks. I wanted something that can do it all in a pinch. Heck, you can turn it flat and use it as a small plate to eat off of. (By the way, the same thing applies to hogs, alligators, etc.) Long answer to your question but I figured I'd take the opportunity to give some background into how it was designed to be used. Just buy half a dozen. If you don't like them, give them away as Christmas presents or let them get rusty and turn them into Mike for refunds
This finish is going to look even better when you're on bath salts. Jeff's got some kind of plan for that.
Since Jeff posted about the cleaver, let me just drop this hint of things to come: free cleaver included in the "Expat Experience" for those of you eligible to attend. (By eligible, I mean you have a passport....)
There's a whole bunch of sketchy things planned around this new launch. Some may require bail money. Some are clothing optional. None are normal.
I can attest to everything Expat said. I'm looking forward to putting one of these to work in the restaurant. We can certainly use one to its fullest. To me this would be a pretty cool car camping/ extended hunting tool too. I've got a few ideas to put it to work. Most importantly I'm so glad ESEE is finally releasing a tool that is impervious to rust and made for throwing.
I plan on securing it in a tide pool for a couple of months. Thats how you get a good "patina", right?
Thanks for the heads up. After I asked that question, I went to the Cleaver 1 thread, saw this photo, and it looked better. Made more sense too: