{"id":14056,"date":"2025-11-24T08:06:38","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T00:06:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=14056"},"modified":"2025-11-24T08:06:38","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T00:06:38","slug":"how-hong-kong-born-chefs-chinese-kitchen-knives-are-cutting-through-stigma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=14056","title":{"rendered":"How Hong Kong-born chef\u2019s Chinese kitchen knives are cutting through stigma"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

Sean Warmington-Wan is a man who wears many hats: chef, food anthropologist, entrepreneur. But these days, he is best known as the founder of Fragrant Knives, a small but fast-growing brand built around one simple idea: to spread his love of Chinese knives.<\/p>\n

Born in Hong Kong but raised in the UK, Warmington-Wan grew up straddling two cultures. During university, he lost his mother, who had been the cook in the family, and felt cut off from his heritage, which reignited his interest in food.<\/p>\n

He still remembers the gift that kick-started his journey \u2013 an old cai dao<\/em>, or Chinese cleaver<\/span>, from the 1980s forged by the famous Hong Kong knifemaker Chan Chi-kee, which was passed down by his grandmother.<\/div>\n
It was battered and plain, nothing like the polished Japanese knives<\/span> he admired as a young cook. But it would slowly change everything he thought he knew about kitchen tools.<\/div>\n

\u201cKnives are the most important tool that you have in kitchens,\u201d he says. \u201cIt frustrates me when I see them not being used and treated more like beautiful objects. That\u2019s not the mindset I have when it comes to cooking, and I\u2019m a bit more utilitarian.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Chinese<\/div>
Chinese cleavers, the kind that inspired Warmington-Wan to start Fragrant Knives, are seen for sale on a street in Hong Kong. Photo: Instagram\/fragrantknives<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Out to change attitudes towards blades, Fragrant Knives produces one of its own \u2013 one that is cleaver-shaped but is not a Western butcher\u2019s cleaver. It is closer to a Chinese version of a nakiri<\/em> (Japanese vegetable knife), designed for everyday tasks rather than hacking through bone.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


\n
Read Full Article At Source <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sean Warmington-Wan is a man who wears many hats: chef, food anthropologist, entrepreneur. But these days, he is best known as the founder of Fragrant…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[9433,107,9346,3569,5723,10366,10326,10579],"class_list":["post-14056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bored-interesting","tag-chefs","tag-chinese","tag-cutting","tag-hong","tag-kitchen","tag-knives","tag-kongborn","tag-stigma","wpcat-33-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14056"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14056\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}