Lessons > How to Cut Using a Chef's Knife

Your culinary journey starts here

★★★★★ (195)

55,660 Students
All Levels

Lesson Overview

Excellent cooks can perform a variety of precise knife cuts quickly and efficiently. This is because they have perfected their knife skills by practicing over and over again. It is important to remember, however, that all successful chefs once started as novices – awkward at first – but with dete…

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Lesson Objectives

At the end of this lesson you'll be able to:
  • slice and dice a variety of ingredients
  • understand that most fancy names for cutting are simply variations of slicing
  • understand how to vary your approach to processing different sizes of ingredients
  • stabilize ingredients and anchor your knife to increase knife safety

Course Syllabus

START: Watch Lesson Platform Tour
1. How to Cut Using a Chef's Knife
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2. Complete Your Self Assessment
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3. Slicing and Dicing
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4. Slicing Safety
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5. Slicing Long, Flat Ingredients
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6. Slicing Round Ingredients
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7. Slicing Large-Shaped Ingredients
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8. Slicing Odd-Shaped Ingredients
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9. Slicing Bunched Ingredients
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10. Size of Knife Cuts
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11. Activity | Label Knife Cuts
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12. Practice Activities & Recipes
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13. Lesson Quiz
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Practice Recipes

A few of the practice recipes you'll learn in this lesson.

Prerequisites & Related Lessons

Please consider these additional lessons to support your learning and discovery. Some of these lessons are prerequisites that may help contextualize what you are learning and form a baseline of knowledge and skill. Other lessons are related and may help you explore next steps or dive deeper on a learning topic.

Selecting a Knife Set

8 Tasks | 7 Videos

★★★★★ (521)

Handling a Chef's Knife

10 Tasks | 10 Videos | 5 Recipes

★★★★★ (354)

Knife Sharpening w/ a Whetstone

7 Tasks | 6 Videos

★★★★★ (174)

What People Are Saying

"My risotto was as good as any from Hell's Kitchen according to a nurse and 2 therapist. :)" ★★★★★
"Great lesson. Did exactly what I wanted it to do." ★★★★★
"great" ★★★★★
"I learned about safety is paramount..." ★★★★★
"As usual, very efficient and detailed lesson! Very useful!" ★★★★
"Getting better at my knife skills, all instruction is so well demonstrated. Thanks" ★★★★★
"Well presented, in bite size chunks. Easy to digest." ★★★★★
"I really like the safety approach on it." ★★★★
"Great lesson!" ★★★★★
"Easy to understand." ★★★★★
"I have always wanted to improve my knife skills to make cooking quicker and more enjoyable. What a wonderful complete lesson on knife skills. I feel inspired to go out and get a professional chefs knife." ★★★★★
"This was a good and well presented lesson easy to go through and informative." ★★★★★
"Very visual, interesting and formative. I have learn a lot of new things and techniques. Great lesson! Thank you." ★★★★★
"Thank you for the chart about cutting sizes. This really helped my understanding." ★★★★★
"Real nice videos and lesson" ★★★★★
"Very easy to follow and quite informative" ★★★★★
"Watching this lesson confirmed I am using the correct technique for most cuts. An explanation of the french terms was very helpful and I appreciated showing so many different sizes and shapes of vegetables. I would have liked more demonstrations with different kinds of herbs and herb leaves come in different sizes and technique for getting the leaves off the stem differ. I struggle when cooking with Thyme for example, as it takes me so long to get the leaves off the stem." ★★★★
"I love the demonstrations." ★★★★★
"It is a very complete lesson." ★★★★★
"Wonderful presentation and materials! Great Job, Rouxbe!" ★★★★★
"Basic but fundamental knowledge!" ★★★★★
"This was awesome." ★★★★★
"Very precise, great terminological desciptions." ★★★★
"Good, informative lesson" ★★★★★
"The lesson was okay but it marked one question incorrectly - The question in error was actually marked as diced or #2 but when the quiz was graded the answer was switched to 3, or rolling, and marked incorrectly. :("
"I love you Rouxbe! Thank you for all the lessons I learn!" ★★★★★
"Great educational lesson....." ★★★★★
"This was helpful, but it would be nice to have notes written for you." ★★★★
"love love love this lesson will keep you safe" ★★★★★
"Very helpful to getting the right ideas." ★★★★★
"So helpful!" ★★★★★
"I leaned alot, enjoyed it, very good for the beginner." ★★★★★
"Thanks to Rouxbe for this great platform." ★★★★
"What a huge help to be able to use my chef knife with more accuracy and skill. I use to just wack away with any knife but now I find myself reaching for this knife to do most of my cutting now." ★★★★★
"I really like it, start enjoying it, tks" ★★★★
"I learned a lot about how to cut ingredients and handling the knife." ★★★★★
"Nice examples and practice ideas" ★★★★★
"I have used the technique shown for dicing onion, I learned one new technique by keeping the stem intact." ★★★★★
"I enjoyed this lesson and learned a lot about specific types of cuts." ★★★★
"Very well done, great lesson." ★★★★★
"The lesson is very specific, videos are exceptional and demonstrate everything that we need to learn" ★★★★★
"I have learn many things as safety, and how I can cut my vegetables accurate." ★★★★★
"Like all Rouxbe lessons this adds to a firm foundation" ★★★★★
"It was a fun lesson, was explained in lots of detail!" ★★★★★
"It is a great experience and learning here in Rouxbe. Thank you" ★★★★★
"i learned alot about cutting" ★★★★★
Show More
10 Videos | 13 Tasks
Task 1: How to Cut Using a Chef's Knife
Task 2: Complete Your Self Assessment
Task 3: Slicing and Dicing
Task 4: Slicing Safety
Task 5: Slicing Long, Flat Ingredients
Task 6: Slicing Round Ingredients
Task 7: Slicing Large-Shaped Ingredients
Task 8: Slicing Odd-Shaped Ingredients

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