When to use, and NOT use a pull through knife sharpener.
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A look at at-home electric and pull-through sharpeners, starting with the Chef’s Choice Nate’s mum gave him twenty years ago. Where these have a place, and what they quietly do to a good knife.
Hello everyone, Nate here with SimplySharp and I wanted to talk a little bit about some of the at-home knife sharpeners, uh especially the electric ones. Um my first sharpener, 20 years ago, my mom gave me a Chef’s Choice. It’s like the kind that it’s got like the three little slots you can put the knives in. It’s got electric motor in there that helps sharpen the knives. Um a lot of knife sharpeners hate all of those. I actually don’t mind them. Um because I have a fun spot in my heart. That’s how I got started with my sharpening. But there is an area where they’re a problem and specifically knives that have this feature. This is a bolster. A lot of western-style knives or a lot of your um Henckels and Wüsthofs and whatnot will have that. When you have a bolster, the sharpening wheel doesn’t get all the way to the back. And so what happens is this part of the blade starts to get ground down and this will be proud. This will stick out proud of it. And now, when you’re trying to cut on a cutting board, you’re not making contact with the back, you know, inch to two or more inches of the knife, depending on how bad that is. And you’re going to leave things like herbs and celery not just not cut all the way through and it’ll be a little frustrating for you. We can fix that, but we have to grind the bolster down to do it. Uh some knives we can’t fix. So a knife like this, I don’t know if you can hear that, but that kind of tinkling noise, that bolster is hollow. I can’t fix that. No sharp sharpener can fix that. If we tried to, we’d open up a hole in your knife and ruin it. So, be careful with those bolstered knives in your pull-through sharpener. Uh a knife like this, no bolster, I say go for it. Uh might catch some flak from fellow sharpeners, but in my mind, I always thought that tool served me well when I was using it. Thanks everyone. Hope that helps. Stay sharp.
