Yanagiba
specialtyA long, single-bevel Japanese knife, 24-30 cm blade, designed for slicing raw fish in one continuous pull-stroke. The single-bevel grind (sharpened only on the right side for right-handed cooks) leaves a glossy, undamaged cell wall on each sashimi slice — push-and-saw cutting tears the flesh and dulls the visual sheen. Premium yanagiba use white-paper steel (shirogami) at 62-64 HRC, an extreme hardness that requires daily honing on a whetstone.
The yanagiba evolved from the Edo-period (17th-19th c.) shobu-bocho — a willow-leaf-shaped fish knife adopted by Tokyo sushi chefs as nigiri sushi standardized. Sakai (Osaka) became the knife-forging capital with its 16th-century connection to Portuguese tobacco-knife trade; today over 90% of professional Japanese kitchen knives are still forged there.