[jyl]

On knives - I like Wusthofs, Henkels, Sabatier, etc but I find them pretty expensive. Carbon is neat if you're the only one who uses it, otherwise your wife puts it away wet and you get in an argument (while holding knives). Check out a professional restaurant supply store, they have sturdy functional knives in all shapes and sizes.

In Tokyo I saw shops specializing in fish knives, there were 4 foot long "knives" meant to slice fillets from 300 lb tunas - realy awesome if you have a few thousand dollars to spare.

My ideal knife set would be a couple of paring knives, 8" chefs and slicers, a couple of 10" or 12" chefs, serrated bread knife, a couple of sushi knives, a fish knife (go to a fishing shop), a heavy Chinese cleaver, and some shears. I'd have picked them up all over the world, in the Tokyo fish market, in Paris, in Toledo, etc and each one would have a story. In practice, I have a motley mix of serviceable blades.

Also important are a good steel and a large whetstone stone.