I finally asked a retired butcher about his sharpening routine

I ran into old man Henderson at the hardware store in Springfield last Thursday, and he asked how my edges were holding up. He said he never uses a powered sharpener on his boning knives, only a 1000 grit whetstone and a leather strop. He told me, 'Speed ruins steel, patience makes it sing.' That stuck with me because I've been using an electric sharpener for years thinking it was fine. Has anyone else made the switch from powered to hand sharpening for their daily blades?

3 comments

3 Comments

chen.hugo1mo ago

Man, that electric sharpener regret is real. I burned through the edge on my favorite paring knife before I figured out what was happening. The control you get with a stone just feels totally different, like you're actually fixing the metal instead of just chewing it up.

dakota_rodriguez1mo ago

My electric sharpener basically turned my good chef's knife into a bread saw. I followed a YouTube tutorial last month and spent like two hours on a cheap stone. Ngl, the first time I tried to slice a tomato after that, it went through like it was air. I felt so stupid for all the years I was just grinding my blades into nothing.

holly_flores7917d agoTop Commenter

Burned the edge off a cheap filet knife with an electric sharpener last year, had to regrind the whole thing with a hand file. Learned my lesson the hard way. @dakota_rodriguez that tomato test is the real deal, I sliced my thumb open on a bell pepper the other day and didn't even feel it until I saw the blood. Switched to a 1000/6000 combo stone from Amazon and my knives actually hold an edge now instead of turning into scrapers after a week.