Steel, Fire, and a Sharp Eye: Inside Babbling Brooks Blades

KC James Brooks has spent years working as a chef and running a sandwich food truck, which means he has always had strong opinions about knives. That hands-on relationship with cutlery eventually pulled him in a new direction. Today he runs Babbling Brooks Blades, crafting Damascus pattern steel into Japanese-style kitchen knives in his own workshop.

A visit to Japan, where Brooks watched bladesmiths at work firsthand, sharpened his interest into something more serious. He came home and went deep. The process he now uses layers two specific types of steel, with the nickel content in one repelling the acid and coffee used in etching to draw out the distinctive Damascus pattern. His favorite shape to forge is the santoku, a Japanese everyday knife he describes as a kind of all-purpose workhorse. "Once you get down the rabbit hole of making knives," he says, "you're like, 'This is so fun.'"

Brooks arrived in Eugene around 2005 or 2006 for school at the University of Oregon and never left. His food truck has put him inside nearly every brewery in the area over the years, building friendships and a real sense of community along the way. He describes the people behind those businesses as caring about where they live, and that spirit is part of what keeps him here.

When he is not at the forge or the truck, Brooks heads to Pisgah, hiking the full peak and stopping at the swing at the top. The breweries, the trails, and what he calls the quirky, individual character of Eugene add up to something that feels genuinely his. As he puts it, Eugene is definitely home.