I remember Daddy sharpening his carving knife on that piece of steel right before carving a ham or the Thanksgiving Turkey. But in general, he would sharpen all his knives on his grinder. When I moved out of the house, I took with me a carving knife and a paring knife. No sharpener. So, for years, I cut all of my meats with a dull knife. It never occurred to me that it would be so much easier to thin-slice chicken breast with a sharp knife.
For our wedding, Uncle Frank and Aunt Melanie gave us a set of knives, in a butcher block, with a sharpening steel. Now, all of my chicken is thin-sliced quickly and efficiently; tomatos are no match for me; and tiny grapes (which require quartering for baby mouths) hardly squirm at all under a sharpened knife.
What a difference it makes!
4 comments:
Mmhmm. There are two reasons your knife would be dull, either the fine edge is bent, or it's broken off. The sharpening steel straightens bent edges, but if it's broken off, it needs a grinding stone!
So far, the steel has worked fine, so I'm guessing it's bent edges. I guess I'll find out later on if anything is broken!
I know they call it a sharpening steel, but it isn't actually "sharpening" your blade. As Jennie said, the edge of your blade can and does become bent over. By running it along the steel, you are pushing it back into place. The best way to do this is to go slow (you don't have to go fast like you see Daddy do . . . lol You are more likely to whack the edge of the blade into the steel and ding your sharp edge) and swipe your knife across the steel 5 times on one side, 5 on the other, then 4 on one, 4 on the other and so forth until you've done it once on each side. This prevents you from pushing the edge too far to one side should you be holding it at the wrong angle . . .
And this whole process is called honing, not sharpening!
Hope I've been of some help!
Hmmm... I usually just rub it along the steel on one side, then flip it and do the same on the other. It seems to work (and that's how Martha Stewart does it too!).
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