A dough knife — better known as a bench knife or dough scraper — is the kitchen utensil used for cutting and scraping dough when baking. The classic form is a broad, stiff rectangle of stainless steel with a handle along one edge: it cuts risen dough into portions, lifts sticky dough off the bench, scrapes the work surface clean, and scoops up chopped ingredients. A flexible plastic version does the gentler work of folding and turning soft doughs inside the bowl. Bakers reach for it constantly — dividing, portioning, cleaning as they go — and its sharp straight edge portions dough more cleanly than any knife, without dragging. It is one of the cheapest tools in the bakery and one of the most used: the mark of a baker is a bench kept clean with the scraper between every task.