Nojiyama Marunaka Kurouchi Ajikiri 120mm

The ajikiri is named after horse mackerel, which is aji in Japanese. In Japan this knife is mostly associated with preparing small fish, and it's particularly useful for removing the lateral scutes ('zeigo') from horse mackerel - you have to remember that Japan is a nation of specialties and specialists and there are those who do nothing but prepare small fish all day, every day. Nice to have the right-size knife.

For the rest of us, fundamentally the ajikiri is a small kitchen knife and a very useful one at that. In profile it may look like a small, heavy deba but it's not - ajikiri knives have a short, thin light blade that will take care of root vegetables as well as any pan-size and smaller fish. Short, sharp, light - no shortage of applications.