A good set of knives is the foundation for any serious kitchen. It is simply not possible to be a serious cook, to produce superior meals that will impress and delight your friends, without a set of kitchen knives that work with you, not against you. If you use ill-suited knives, or just poor quality knives, you are only making things harder for you in the kitchen. If you are an aspiring cook, or an accomplished cook who is just simply tired of making things more difficult than they need to be, this article will help you put together a set of quality kitchen knives.

Your First Kitchen Knives: The Basics

The single most important knife in your kitchen, and the starting point for any collection, is the Chef's knife, sometimes known as the Cook's knife. As the name suggests, this is your general all-purpose knife, able to do everything from mincing to chopping to slicing and to dicing. The Chef's knife has a gently slopping blade and is usually around 8 inches long. The next knife you should invest in is the little brother to the Chef's knife, the paring knife. The paring knife is basically just a smaller version of the Chef's knife. The paring knife is designed for more detailed or intricate jobs than the Chef's knife. A paring knife usually measures around 4 inches long or shorter. The third knife you should purchase to complete your basic set of kitchen knives is a bread knife. The bread knife should ideally be about the same size as your Chef's knife, but instead of a straight blade, the bread knife will have a serrated edge. A knife with a serrated edge resembles a saw blade, with the blade having a series of u-shaped cuts into it. The bread knife is obviously great for slicing bread. It is also useful however, for cutting food that would be squashed from the pressure of a straight blade.

After you have established your basic collection, the possible additions to your collection are endless. You could buy a myriad of larger knives such as cleavers (large rectangular knives designed for cutting through bones and joints) or smaller knives such as tomato knives, utility knives or even grapefruit knives.

Caring For Your Knives

Even if you have purchased only moderately priced knives, you should be interested in learning how to preserve your investment. Knives will become dull over time as they are used. Fortunately, you can take a number of easy steps to help prolong the life of your blades. The most important step is to never put your knives in the dishwasher; you kitchen knives should always be washed by hand with a mild detergent and then hand dried. The second step is to always use a cutting board; other surfaces can damage your knife blade. The third step is to have your blades sharpened by a professional. And finally, do not keep your knives in a draw with all your other junk - the knives should be keep out of contact with any other metal in a knife block.

As you may know, there has been a real need for a single cellular phone directory - cell phone white pages so to speak - in order to help people find necessary cell phone numbers to reach their friends and family, and to find out whose number is showing up on the Caller ID. However, while most cellular phone providers are currently taking part in a project that will include all of the numbers in a single directory, Verizon has refused to participate in this opt-in service that will list the cellular phone numbers.

As cellular phones become much more popular - and, often replace landlines altogether - the demand for a practical white pages services is ever growing. Not only are searchers hoping to see a functional cell phone number directory, but so are the cell phone subscribers themselves. The desire on the subscriber side started slowly, but it is now climbing more quickly.

However, the one primary concern is privacy. Cell phone users don't want to be made susceptible to telemarketing on their cell phones. This is especially true in the case where cellular phones are left on while driving, and for customers who pay for their cell phone use by the minute. Cell phone users are already being inundated with unwanted text message ads and emails on their cell phones. It will only get worse it telemarketers work their way onto the scene.

For this reason, the database in the works is also being kept quite secret, and there is no plan to open it up to the public. The use for the database will be for those who phone 411. The database will never be open to sale to telemarketers. The operators will need to use passwords to access the information of an individual, and then they are required to immediately purge the data. Calling 411 for the mobile number will come with a fee ranging somewhere between 25 cents to $2.50 per search - much too costly for telemarketers.