These are the sorts of things that won't yield to a specific keyword search (because you aren't giving the search engine the "terms of art" used people who use the thing), but where you can probably figure these out pretty quickly if you just do a search to find some kind of index for the category-of-thing and start browsing.

I'd recommend search queries like "types of knives", "obscure kitchen utensils", "what is this knife", etc.

You can also try giving /r/tipofmytongue or a related subreddit a very detailed description of the object. Some of the results from the above queries point to people asking questions like this on subreddits like /r/tools.

(Or you could do the same thing with ChatGPT — but that'll only work if someone has ever before described the object in a book or on the Internet somewhere, in the terms you're using. ChatGPT can only match your verbal questions to verbal memories. Whereas a person on a subreddit can take your description, conjure a mental image of it, and then correlate that mental image with a visual memory.)

I'll also take a shot at giving you starting points, just because I happen to find learning about weird kitchen tools fascinating:

> Like a ridiculously long knife with a slightly curved blade, rounded tip, and blunt edge.

A cake-icing spatula of some kind? I would imagine one made specifically for smoothing the icing on the side of a cylindrical layer cake would have this shape.

Usually cake spatulas are also offset (blade makes two complementary bends and so ends up parallel to, but not in line with, the handle), but they don't have to be.

> Or a serrated knife with that curves back on itself.

If the end can also be used as a fork, then that's a cheese knife.

I would also add /r/whatisthisthing to your list of subreddits as well. I subscribe to it just to learn about all kinds of obscure tools and utensils.

Ironically, that was the subreddit I wanted to use as the best example of a place to ask questions... but I just couldn't think of its name. :)

The first knife could also be a grapefruit knife?

Yeah, growing up my mom had a grapefruit knife. It's used to "scoop" the flesh out of half z grapefruit. It's a really weird looking utensil if you don't know what it's for.

Interestingly I can't find any pictures of what we had online. Ours had a serated blade (both top and bottom) and was arc'd through 90 degrees to the side.

> > Like a ridiculously long knife with a slightly curved blade, rounded tip, and blunt edge.

> A cake-icing spatula of some kind?

Perhaps! The blade is not tall/wide like a spatula, and the handle is oriented like a knife would be, not a spatula, but... it could be!

> > Or a serrated knife with [a blade] that curves back on itself.

> If the end can also be used as a fork, then that's a cheese knife.

Maybe! I've seen a lot of cheese knives over the years but this one is unlike any I've ever seen.

My guess is that it's for hollowing something out. If so, it'd be for something that's hard to get into but isn't super tough. Like... maybe scraping all the seeds out of a squash or something.

The blade is straight for maybe 4-5" then does a ~80 degree bend to the right and then curves back around to make a full circle back to the blade, making a roughly 2" circle of metal. I'm writing this from memory, so could be off a bit.

... it's basically bent to be a question mark.

My first thought was gut hook knife, but if it's especially question mark shaped it could be a "rescue knife". They often have a backwards facing cutting edge for seatbelts and the like.

Example: https://eknives.com/microtech-combat-troodon-rescue-otf-tool...

Grapefruit knife?

Grapefruit knife is the only knife I've seen that arcs at all, but even that is just a minor 15 degree bend. This blade has a full circle!

I've found this is one case where LLMs are very helpful.

I tried the Wikipedia picture with ChatGPT. Surely, I thought, that would give it the best chance.

> I found this in the kitchen. Do you know what it’s for?

> This object is a ceramic spoon rest. It's used in the kitchen to hold spoons, spatulas, or other utensils that are being used while cooking, helping to keep the countertop clean and preventing the utensil from touching other surfaces. The design typically features a slightly curved shape to accommodate the handle of the utensil and prevent it from sliding off.

…well, at least it invented a use case that would actually work? That is in fact what I’d probably do with one. Though know that I know what they’re for, I kinda want to put one in milk.

I'm pretty sure the hammers are for breaking up large blocks of chocolate; I've got them with blocks from old-fashioned chocolatiers that don't score their blocks.

I know it as a "toffee hammer".

Yes, the hammer is the one I actually know what it's for (breaking up large sheets of toffee or chocolate bricks), because they labeled it!

My point was that it sure would be nice if the other weird things in my kitchen had had a label.

Hello friend

This community is a good resource for that: http://reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/