There are a few things that set Cudaway apart from our competitors. One of the cornerstones of Cudaway is that we make all of our knife blades in-house by hand through a process called stock removal.

First off… What is stock removal?

In a nutshell, stock removal is the art of hand-grinding a knife from a solid piece of steel — no shortcuts and no automation. Hand-grinding takes serious attention to detail, years of practice, and a relentless pursuit of perfection.

Most production knife don’t hand-grind because it’s slow, demanding, and hard to master. So why do we insist on hand-grinding our blades?

We have a couple of reasons:

First, stock removal allows us to grind our blades significantly thinner than our competitors. Cudaway knives will always cut like a sharper as less blade material is cutting through the object. It's the difference between slicing... and struggling.

Second, stock removal allows us to create an aesthetically beautiful knife. The precision of stock removal allows our knife makers to achieve exacting tolerances, clean transitions, and a knife that stands above the rest of the pack. This is especially important for high-performance chef knives that must look as great as they feel.

The vast majority of knives in stores and online are made by machines. Take a look at most production chef knives and you’ll see it: that harsh ridge where the thin blade slams into the thick tang — a telltale sign of automated grinding.

While efficient, this kind of automation means thicker blades and less creative capacity to craft a beautiful, clean knife. At Cudaway, we look at the blade face of a knife as an open canvas, and we take pride in our knives, which are free from ugly plunge lines and machine marks. From the tip to the tang, every transition is smooth, seamless, and sculpted by hand.

We bring old-school craftsmanship back to every blade we make, chasing a level of visual and performance perfection you can feel in your hand.

At Cudaway, we hand-grind our knives because it’s our goal to make knives that outperform anything else on the counter — and look damn good doing it.