sharp

I'm going to make an effort to expand the topics I discuss on Scratch to include techniques, books, and whatever else is related to cooking everything from scratch. Lately I've been looking for any sort of project to keep me busy. This particular project didn't exactly take very long from start to finish, but I'm certainly glad I now know how to sharpen my own knives. All you really need is a stone, which cost about as much as getting a couple knives sharpened at Sur La Table. Then, as it turns out, there are plenty of great videos on YouTube that demonstrate just how to sharpen your kitchen knives properly with your new water-stone.

So this is a brief summary of what I've learned. Water-stones are the easiest/least messy to use for beginners (vs oil-stones). A simple two grit water-stone is a great place to start. I received a 1000/6000 stone from my sister for Christmas. The 1000 grit side helps you set an edge and the 6000 grit helps you put the finishing touches on it and polish it up. The trick is to maintain the same angle on the blade as you run it over the stone. Exactly how you do it doesn't seem as important. To see exactly how to do it, I recommend spending a little time on YouTube watching videos such as this one.

The results were good. My chef and santoku knives have a nice edge once again. The smaller pairing knives were harder to sharpen properly since it's hard to get a nice long stroke across the stone. Overall, the results aren't perfect, but I'm very happy with my knives now and will give it another shot in a few months.