កាំបិត

What makes the kambit useful is that it is not specialised. The weight of the blade does the cutting, so the hand only has to guide it; the flat side crushes garlic and ginger and then carries them to the pot; the spine bruises lemongrass before it goes in the mortar; the broad face clears the whole board in one pass. Nothing about the work asks for a second knife.

It is used against a thick round block cut from a tree trunk rather than a thin board, because the cleaver is meant to come down hard — through chicken joints, through fish, through bundles of herbs at once. The edge is brought back at home on a whetstone instead of being sent out or replaced, and the handle wears smooth to the hand that uses it most. A knife treated this way lasts long enough to stop being a knife and become the knife.

In a Khmer kitchen its day is mostly aromatics: lemongrass sliced thin before it is pounded into kroeung, galangal and turmeric cut down, garlic and shallot smashed flat. Then the heavier work — jointing a chicken for samlor, splitting a fish for the grill. Cambodian Cookbook recommends the kambit before any specialised blade for exactly that reason: one tool covers slicing, smashing, jointing, and scooping the board clean.

Source: Cambodian Cookbook — Kitchen Equipment