Safe Knife Handling 101

Easy-grip handles and non-slip cutting boards are just two must-haves to avoid the hazards of slicing and dicing in the kitchen.

The last thing you want when you’re busy cooking dinner? Being forced to take a side trip to the emergency room to get your finger stitched up. But for more than 350,000 people every year, knife injuries—whether from chopping onions and slicing carrots or whittling wood—result in a trip to urgent care for stitches.

While we can’t guarantee a completely cut-free future when you’re prepping meals, everyone can benefit from fine-tuning their knife-handling skills to lower the odds of a kitchen accident. Learn the best knife safety tips—from pro-chef cutting techniques to smarter knife storage—that will help protect you when you’re on kitchen duty.

Start With Sharp Knives

This may seem counterintuitive, but a dull knife can do much more damage than a sharp one. Dull knives struggle to “bite” through whatever you’re chopping without you applying more force—and that means that your knife is more likely to slip off the carrot or tomato and give you a nice little cut on your finger instead.

To help ensure your knives stay sharp, pull out a knife sharpener every couple of months if you’re slicing and dicing a lot every week, or a few times a year if you aren’t. (Pro tip: While home sharpening will get the job done for most knives, serrated or ceramic knives are best left to a professional sharpener.)

Get a Good Grip

When you’re prepping food in the kitchen, your hands are often damp, making it easy for tools to slip out of your grasp. Pick a kitchen knife that feels good in your hand with a handle that allows you to get a steady grip. OXO knives have a soft, non-slip plastic handle that’s easy to hold and comfortable in your hands to make chopping easier.

Learn How to Chop Like a Pro

You may not be able to slice and dice as quickly as a restaurant chef, but using the same techniques will help you reduce your risk of injury.

Start by adjusting how you hold your knife. Rather than wrapping their hand around the handle, pro chefs actually “choke up” and move their hand up on the knife, placing their thumb and forefinger on either side of the blade, just where it meets the handle. This gives greater control over where (and what) the blade is cutting, and more power in every cut.

Next, adjust how you hold the item being cut. If you watch a pro chef closely, you’ll see that they lightly rest the fingertips of their non-knife hand on top of the item they’re cutting and have their fingers perpendicular to the cutting board—which is called the “claw grip.” By securing the item being sliced, the blade is easily guided to a perfect cut.

The big benefit to the claw grip: You aren’t leaving your fingertips exposed to a knife slip, which helps ensure you don’t end up cutting your fingers instead.

Chop on a Stable Surface

The knife is only one part of the knife safety equation—your cutting board also plays a key role in kitchen safety. A good cutting board should have enough give to avoid dulling your knife, so wood, silicone, or plastic are the best materials to use. It should also stay steady beneath your food and knife, so you can take every cut with confidence. OXO cutting boards offer non-slip bases and easy-grip handles to help you avoid a major slip-up. Tip: If your cutting board has a tendency to slip when you’re cutting, you can use a damp kitchen towel or a silicone baking mat underneath it to help hold it in place.

Store Your Knives Safely

That countertop knife block isn’t the only option for storing your kitchen knives—and if you have curious kids around your house, it may not be the safest option, either. A safer bet? OXO knives come with locking sheaths so you can store them in kitchen drawers without worrying that someone will accidentally cut themselves, while also preventing the blade from becoming dull or damaged after bumping into other tools in the drawer.

Before you put these knife safety pro tips into practice, learn which type of knife works best for every item you need to slice and dice, so you use the right tool for the job.