We have all bought great knives and are proud of them. But time passes, cuts come one after another and little by little we tend to put this knife at the bottom of the drawer because it is less and less effective. This topic will allow you to know the different springs to maintain the sharpness of your knife without damaging the edge.
Recommendations for using kitchen knives
Before talking about sharpening or honing, it is necessary to have better knowledge about good daily practices so as not to tire it too quickly. You probably don't know it, but the following practices are strongly discouraged:
- Cut butter
- Breaking bones
- Pick up your vegetables, meat, fish cut with the edge of the knife
- Put the knife in the dishwasher
- ...
While some of these practices may seem obvious to you, others may be more worrisome, such as butter. It is true that some foods, such as butter, due to their very high fat content, will not help maintain the sharpness of a knife. We recommend having a knife only for this type of food in order to preserve the others for all other cuts.
The different possibilities for sharpening your knife
Let's go into detail to guide you on how to carry out this essential step. You probably know some somewhat ancestral methods, like rubbing two knives together to restore their sharpness. So you can do it, but know that it will not be thanks to this grandmother's trick that the blade will be optimized as it should be.
Other sharpening possibilities are:
- The knife sharpener
- The rifle
- Japanese stone
We will detail these three possibilities. First, the knife sharpener is a good solution when you do not want to spend a lot of time on this task. There are several ranges of sharpeners that affect the final sharpening quality. This accessory is useful, practical, quick and easy to use. However, it has several drawbacks. Be aware that with this type of product, you will not be able to respect the basic sharpening angle of your knife, which can affect its quality and the sharpening will not be regular. You will therefore have to do it many times to have a correct, but never perfect, edge. Finally, a big downside to this accessory: it breaks the edge of the blade. Indeed, this method is very aggressive for our knives and leads, in almost all cases, to the very rapid deterioration of your edge. If your edge breaks, you will never again have a knife that is perfect in its precision and cutting quality.
Let's move on to the sharpening steel. Here, we are on a good accessory allowing you to control the sharpening and offering the possibility of respecting a sharpening angle. When using the steel, you will have to be careful not to scratch your blade by movements that are too sudden and uncontrolled. However, it is a good alternative solution in order to quickly sharpen your knife, but to be carried out with great mastery.
Finally, the Japanese stone is offered as the best sharpening method. It is the best, but it is also the most complex and the longest. On the other hand, it is a fascinating art that respects the knife. When this method is mastered to perfection, you will be able to:
- Respect the sharpening angle
- Adjust this angle if a previous sharpening has modified it
- Obtain a wire identical to that of the new knife
So this method is long since it is carried out in several stages and with stones having different grains to achieve perfection.
How often should we sharpen our knife?
Although this question seems simple, there is no universal answer. Why? Quite simply, a chef will use his knives much more than an amateur. So although the frequency plays an essential role, the food cut also plays a role in the wear of the knife. In order to give a figure on this frequency, we would say that for regular use of the knife for anyone who is not a professional, it is necessary to sharpen its blade approximately every 3 to 6 months to avoid damaging it. This sharpening mainly concerns sharpening with a Japanese stone. The other alternatives require more interventions on the blade for identical use.
