Knife Sharpening Methods:
There are few tools more dangerous than a dull knife! It'll slide when you want it to cut and it'll cut when it stops sliding--usually when it hits your hand. Ask ten different people how they sharpen their knives, however, and you may get ten different answers. Not only that, but each of these ten methods are all sworn to be the best by ten venerable trail guides from ten mountain towns (who've all been sharpening knives since they were knee-high to a carpenter ant and don't you forget it buddy). What's a poor soul with a dull knife to do? You can start with this tutorial, which will lead you out of the tangled thicket of knife-sharpening opinions.
This knife sharpening tutorial will hopefully teach you how to sharpen a knife. Knife sharpening is an art and a science. Steels are used to realign the edge on a knife. Stones are used to sharpen the edge once it has grown dull through ordinary use. Most good stones come with a coarse side and a fine side. If your knife is dull, use the coarse side first. Place the sharpening stone on a damp cloth or rubber mat to keep it from moving. Then draw the blade toward you using a 20 degree angle and applying an even moderate pressure. Make strokes of equal number on each side of the blade. After about ten strokes on each side, flip the stone over and move on to the finer grit. Wash the particles off and finish by honing your knife on steel.
If you keep your knife set in a wooden block, consider storing them up-side down. This way the knife will slide in and out of the block on its back, not the blade, extending the sharpness of the knife. Do not store your knives in drawers where they can get nicked by other utensils and get dull again, also, you do not want to reach into a drawer and cut yourself.
