How to sharpen a knife so that it shines like new?
The difference between reverse stubble and smooth stubble
Most people sharpen their knives with reverse stubble, which is very bright and shiny, but it's not as fun to use, because the blade with reverse stubble has tiny grooves, which makes it difficult to cut vegetables.
▲Wrong way of sharpening the knife
(This way of sharpening the knife from the mechanical point of view is called the reverse stubble, cut up the vegetables with resistance)
▲Correct way of sharpening the knife
(This way of sharpening the knife from the mechanical point of view is called the smooth stubble, cut up the vegetables with no resistance)
This is the reason why the street sharpening masters are all the way to sharpen the knife as the picture above shows.
Sharpening five major mistakes
1, the wrong angle
Many newcomers will be the blade and grinding stone vertical grinding, but do not know that this will result in a rolled edge, so the law will be slipped in the sharpening stone on the groove marks, shorten the sharpening stone and knife life.
Countermeasures: diagonal sharpening method
Whether you grind the knife vertically or horizontally, you should grind along the diagonal, so that the knife in a back and forth grinding, can be uniformly in contact with the sharpening stone, to avoid the emergence of the rolled edge, the surface of the sharpening stone damaged phenomenon.
2, push and pull the wrong
Sharpening the knife before pushing and pulling the speed and force of the same, just grinding the knife edge will be pushed forward, resulting in a dull knife edge.
Countermeasures:
Sharpening strength must be light push heavy pull, because the front push is choking the edge to go, while the back pull is along the edge to go, so the back pull to add force, so that you can not only sharpen the blade, but also to avoid damage to the blade.
Remember, push forward with less force and at a slower speed so as not to wear down the blade.
3, the wrong position
Two legs stand in a zigzag pattern, the power can not all be used to pull the knife, and a long time to sharpen the knife is easy to cause fatigue.
Countermeasures:
Two legs stand I-zigzag, the weight of the body on the front leg, so that the weight of the body will be transferred to sharpening the knife, save energy, good results.
4, tilt angle error
The angle of the knife and the whetstone is too large, so that although the knife can be sharpened faster in a shorter period of time, but it is easy to cause both sides of the knife mark is thicker in a short period of time to cut and match, the knife mark will be blunted.
Countermeasures:
The angle between the knife and the sharpening stone should be kept below 5 degrees to increase the contact surface between the knife and the sharpening stone, and thin the knife mark on both sides. The thinner the sides of the knife mark, the faster the knife blade and the best cutting and matching results.
5, the wrong approach
In the grinding of the hand holding the knife surface, which can not be uniform force, and easy to cause the two sides of the knife print is not the same thickness, but also easy to cause finger injuries.
Countermeasures:
The right hand holds the back of the knife, the left thumb and forefinger pinch the blade, the diagonal direction of the light push heavy pull, the number of times the two sides of the push and pull to be consistent.
Selection of sharpening stone
Domestic sharpening stone
Domestic sharpening stone can be roughly divided into two kinds, one is a combination of fine grinding and coarse grinding, its main component is yellow sand and green sand, the former's main role is to give the new knife edge, or will have a gap in the knife quickly grinding flat, the latter is to open the edge of the knife blade to grind fast, this kind of sharpening stone belongs to the natural grinding stone.
There is another kind of artificial whetstone synthesized with adamantine, which is generally called oil mill by carpenter masters. After the knife blade has been sharpened by the fine grinding stone, and finally after the fine grinding by the oil grinding, the blade will be as bright as a mirror, and the blade will be sharp, with the best effect.
Japanese Sharpening Stones
The existing sharpening stones on the market are divided into two categories: natural and synthetic, of which natural sharpening stones are divided into water stones and oil stones. Here, we introduce the Japanese water stone.
In Japan, whetstones have a fine numbering system based on the size of the component particles - the more particles, the finer.
If your knife is very dull, or chipped or deformed, you need a sharpening stone with about 220# grits. These coarse grains will help you quickly repair a damaged kitchen knife by eliminating the excess on the blade.
If your knife is merely rusty, but not damaged, a #1000?#1500 medium sharpening stone is usually sufficient.
Other than that, a #3000 sharpening stone can be used to polish the edge. But if you want your knives to have a beautiful shine, then #6000 and #8000 are essential because this fine grit will not only help the knife to form a sharp edge, but will also make the entire edge as fine and smooth as a mirror. And a knife sharpened with #8000 grit will last longer than one sharpened with #3000 (or even #4000).
Tip:
This numbering system only applies to waterstones; if you're working with oilstones or other synthetics, the same basic principles will apply, but the corresponding amount of grit will vary.
How to use a sharpening stone
1. Wet the sharpening stone
Let the stone soak for about 10 minutes in a plastic container filled with room temperature greenhouse water.
2. Form a burr
Put the blade against the sharpening stone, still holding the angle of a matchbox to polish. If you're a novice, 6 strokes per side is a good pace for sharpening, and if you're a veteran, 1 sharpening and 1 change will be more time efficient. Once you notice a neat fine burr on the face of the knife, it's time to stop and switch to a finer sharpening stone (don't forget the tip of the knife when you're sharpening).
3. Remove scratches and polish
Take out the #1000 grit stone, wet the surface of the stone, and use it in the same manner as you would a rough stone, letting the knife glide horizontally.
4.Final Edge Repair
Take out the #3000/8000 combo grit stone to wet its surface. Then using the same technique, shape and polish the edge. Finish by wiping the waste off the knife face with a cleaning topiary.
Knife care
Knives need to be maintained regularly to keep them always sharp and to ensure that they are ready to be taken when you work on them.
Knife maintenance to do the following:
1, operation, to care for the blade, the various knives should be used properly, such as slicing knife is not suitable for chopping, chopping; cutting knife is not suitable for chopping large bones. Transportation of the knife to be able to disconnect the raw material shall prevail, reasonable use of the blade of the knife parts, drop the knife such as resistance, should be checked in time to see if there is no bone residue, otherwise it is easy to hurt the blade.
2, after using the knife must use hot water to wash the knife, dry water. Especially cut salty, or with sticky raw materials, such as pickles, squash, lotus root, rhombus, etc.. Because it contains tannic acid, easy to oxidize and blacken the surface of the knife after cutting, and salt stains on the knife is corrosive, such as not in time to scrub the knife will affect the life of the knife period.
3, long time no use of the knife, should be coated with a layer of grease on both sides of the knife body to prevent rust; by the clear wipe the knife should be placed on the knife rack, the blade can not be placed on hard objects.
4, pass the knife, the knife handle toward each other, and the knife blade down, until the other party to hold the knife handle before you can let go. Do not play with the knife, which is very likely to be dangerous.
5, walking with a knife, the right hand across the knife handle, close to the right side of the abdomen, the blade up. Do not face outward, hand dance, so as not to hurt others.
6, when the operation is completed, should be placed in the middle of the pier surface, not before the tip of the knife, after the knife is not exposed to C, and the back of the knife, the blade should be exposed to the pier surface.
Knife stone and sharpening
When you use a whetstone to sharpen a knife, you are actually rebuilding an edge. During the sharpening process, there will be a lot of metal shavings created located at the very top part of the blade, and they will still be attached to the blade.
As you switch the direction of sharpening, you're going to wipe away a little bit of this metal, and a new blade will be created. Note that during sharpening the blade should always be pointing away from your body, with the blade at 10-15 degrees to the sharpening stone, applying even pressure at about half a thumb's height and going back and forth at an even pace.
During the process, water should be constantly sprinkled on the blade to cool and lubricate it, but not too much water, so that the resistance between the blade and the whetstone will be excessively weakened.
The horizontal position of the sharpening stone is also very important, you can use the professional light-colored sharpening stone nowadays, and first draw a number of simple checkerboard grids on the sharpening stone with a pencil, and if there is a noticeable non-horizontal area on the sharpening stone, the checkerboard grids drawn with the pencil will remain, and in this way the sharpening stone will be kept at a perfect horizontal level, and the head to the end of the knife will be able to be evenly polished.
The best choice for a sharpening stone is one that ranges from 800-2000 grit index. A stone that is too coarse will cause the grooves on the blade to be too deep, and a stone that is too fine will not achieve the desired results. Each side of the blade should take about 10 minutes to polish, and the entire polishing process should take no less than 20 minutes.
Many sharpening stones can now be divided into two sides, one rougher and one more detailed. After leveling both sides of the whetstone in the pencil cross-hatch pattern described above, sand both sides of the blade for five minutes on the rough side, then switch to the fine side and repeat the process once more.
The Master of Taste uses two whetstones, one 1000/3000 and one 600/1500, as shown in the photo; the size of the number represents the number of bumps per unit area; in other words, the smaller the number, the rougher the surface, and the larger the number, the smoother the surface. The time and intensity of sanding should be kept maximally consistent on both sides. Generally speaking, when it's hard to feel the resistance of the blade in your hand and hard for your ears to hear the noise of sharpening, that means it's time to switch sides.
How to judge the effect of sharpening
The most intuitive thing about a fast knife is to look at the blade, and look carefully at it with the naked eye to see if there are any obvious dents in the blade. In the naked eye, to confirm that there is no error then you can carry out a paper test. Use your non-dominant hand to pick up a piece of ordinary printing A4 paper.
Hold the handle of the knife in your dominant hand and cut the paper vertically downwards, if the knife can smoothly, without any frustration, cut the paper out of a large mouth, congratulations, your knife sharpened. If after using a sharpening stone you still can't easily pass the paper test as described above, use a sharpening steel rod as follows for final sharpening.
Daily Maintenance
It's obviously not practical to go through the trouble of sharpening your knives every day with a whetstone, which is where the most common sharpening steel stick in the kitchen comes in handy.
It is a professional habit for many chefs to give their knives a few quick sharpenings before each use. The important thing to note here is to never, ever, ever let the blade point toward your body, and never, ever, ever, ever cross the fingers of the hand that is holding the handle of the sharpening stick over the handle and go directly to the steel stick itself. For if you are not careful, you will cut yourself more than you need to.
Sharpening before each use can be done very quickly, with 5-8 strokes on each side of the blade from end to tip. The purpose of this is to quickly remove the very small, invisible scratches and gouges on the blade from the usual cuts. Keep your knives in top condition at all times.