Showerthought: I was sharpening my knives wrong for years because of my granddad

My granddad taught me to sharpen on a whetstone with this long, smooth pull, and I never questioned it. I was in a shop in Tacoma about five years back, watching this old timer named Carl prep for the day. He was doing these short, quick circles on his stone, and his edge was singing. I asked him about my method, and he just said, 'You're polishing, not cutting. You need to build the burr first, then take it off.' That was the lightbulb. I'd been missing the first step entirely, just wearing down my steel. I went home and tried his way on my 8-inch breaking knife, and the difference was instant. It bit into a pork shoulder like nothing. How many of you had a basic skill you learned wrong from the start?

2 comments

2 Comments

graytorres2d ago

Wait, you were doing that for years without ever feeling the edge? I'd have thought a bad sharpening job would be obvious right away from how it cuts. That's wild it took seeing someone else to figure it out.

nora_wells582d ago

My old chef knife had a rough edge for three years before I noticed. You get used to the extra force needed to push through tomatoes or onions. The real test is slicing a ripe tomato with just the knife's own weight. If it doesn't glide through, your edge is dull. I started checking mine on a paper towel, seeing if it would catch and tear cleanly. That simple trick shows you exactly what the blade is doing.