OV9

Nefarious wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 3:31 pm FYI - once you let a blade go past a certain point of bluntness you won't get it back with a steel - you need to sharpen again on a grinding stone and then use the steel/honing blade to keep it sharp.
On the same subject - sharpeners, steels and honing blades.
A steel isn't really sharpening your knife, it's straightening out the various little bends and dinks at a microscopic level on the very edge of the blade. It has a very mildly abrasive effect but its essentially negligible.
A honing blade is like a fine grade wet and dry. It's effect is primarily abrasive i.e. wearing away imperfections in the blades edge, and to a limited extent reshaping the cutting edge.
Domestic sharpeners (especially the "drag through" kind) are more like a rough grit sand paper are are primarily for shaping the cutting edge. Mostly, they have an arbitrary angle (not necessarily suited to a particular knife) and only shape the first mm/couple of mm. They also leave quite a rough edge (well, rough is precision knife terms). The combination of a poor angle and a rough hone means that a blade won't stay sharp for long.
If you want your knives sharp, you need to "sharpen" (i.e. shape) the blade, then hone it (smooth out the imperfections left by the sharpener) - ideally with progressively finer grit hones. If you've done it right, you'll have a cutting edge only a few micros thick, which is of course very easy to create lots of tiny bends into when you use it, so you use the steel/honing blade to straighten them back out again. Maintenance is far far better than repair - once your blade is properly dull, you need to remove quite a lot of material to get back to a sharp edge again.

Oh, and Sabatier isn't a brand, it's a generic moniker that can be put on anything to make it sound better. It used to indicate that knives were forged (as opposed to pressed), but I don't think there's even that stipulation any more. There are good Sabatiers out there, but there are also very cheap shite knives that add the name purely for marketing purposes.

Carlos wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 4:35 pm

tim wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 2:55 pm I don't seem to be able to sharpen a knife to save my life.

I'm the same and my wife is brutal on kitchen knives she literally will use them for cutting anything.

I've probably bought at least a dozen knives over the last 10 years.

I'm going to get a 3 stage electric sharpener from Chefs Choice to see if I can revive the 5 mixed knives I use.

Barry wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 5:03 pm

Jobbo wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 9:29 am I have a set of Robert Welch knives. They’re not a fancy design but they are beautifully balanced and after 9 years of use they’re not showing any signs of becoming permanently dulled.

That name rang a bell so I checked mine, and I have a pair of his knives. I still keep them in the box too, hence they only come out for special occasions

JonMad wrote: Mon Jan 14, 2019 9:43 am Having just got some new knives for Christmas I should probably look after them. Can't remember the brand, I don't think they were massively expensive - something from Robert Dyas I believe, but they're ok (currently).

Jobbo wrote: Mon Jan 14, 2019 9:38 am

Barry wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 5:03 pm

Jobbo wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 9:29 am I have a set of Robert Welch knives. They’re not a fancy design but they are beautifully balanced and after 9 years of use they’re not showing any signs of becoming permanently dulled.

That name rang a bell so I checked mine, and I have a pair of his knives. I still keep them in the box too, hence they only come out for special occasions

I like some of his table cutlery - though some of it is over-designed. My kitchen knives look quite normal; the ones he sells now have a slightly over-designed handle. So I think (hope) the ones I have are pretty decent as knives because they're not just fashionable. Who knows; turns out they're a bit cheaper than I'd thought. And out of a set of 6, I really only use 2 regularly and the breadknife occasionally, so buying just what you'd use strikes me as the better way to go.

What's the best way of storing knives? Mine are in a simple wooden block with slots; I guess the wood is soft enough compared to steel not to blunt the blades simply putting them back in. I've never been a fan of those magnetic strips on the wall.

Nefarious wrote: All that said, the Tojiro R2s in your link could generate enough irrational desire to justify yet another purchase

mik wrote: Sun Feb 17, 2019 1:09 pmAsk your butcher?

unzippy wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 12:01 am I bought some while we were in Japan for our honeymoon.

KiwiDave wrote: Mon Feb 18, 2019 3:45 am

unzippy wrote: Sun Jan 13, 2019 12:01 am I bought some while we were in Japan for our honeymoon.

How did you go with that getting through customs etc?