Knife sharpeners

I would be really interested in this. I've tried the ones with a suction cup, the ones with three slots for course, medium and fine as well as steels but still struggle and it seems worse the better the knife. I've also tried oilstones, but it's a right faff and I'm probably not doing it right. I would really like a modern, easy to use version, that just works.
 
I have a double ended 'Shimano' bought in a Bass Pro Shop in Florida over 20 years ago for keeping the filleting knife sharp. Two narrow cylinders of abrasive stone set in an offset 'vee' at each end, coarse and fine.

Now in the kitchen draw at home where it 'tickles up' the household knives.

Effective and cheap. Best used wet.
 
My Wife has a sharpener in the drawer which she will not let me have .... and I have tried to get another ... but so far no luck.

It has a handle and then a square metal frame at end ... set into the frame are 5 discs slightly overlapping .... you basically place it down on the table .. and draw the blade through the overlap of the discs ..
It only takes a few strokes and the blade is SHARP !!
 
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A sharpening stone is the way to go - choose one that you lube with water and learn how to use it. It is not difficult you just need a bit of patience. Oh and for the knife choose one with decent steel and not stainless - it is hard to get a decent edge on them and harder to keep.
 
One of my sons is a bit of a gadget freak, and he seems to be turning into a foodie, so I had a chance to play with one of these over Christmas.

Horl-3-knife-sharpener-0238b67.jpg


Ooh - I want one. And they're rated the best sharpener on BBC Good Food Guide.

Then I saw the price, :eek: :eek: :eek:

So I bought one of these

anysharp-2cc0608.jpg


Amazon wants a tenner, but I found it for £4 on eBay, and our knives had never been sharper. Not that that's saying much, but I don't need to shave with them. At that price, I doubt it'll last very long, but I can buy an awful lot of replacements for the price of the top one.
 
My Wife has a sharpener in the drawer which she will not let me have .... and I have tried to get another ... but so far no luck.

It has a handle and then a square metal frame at end ... set into the frame are 5 discs slightly overlapping .... you basically place it down on the table .. and draw the blade through the overlap of the discs ..
It only takes a few strokes and the blade is SHARP !!
I had one like that on the boat. It got lost ! As you say kept knifes sharp and such a basic item.
 
One of my sons is a bit of a gadget freak, and he seems to be turning into a foodie, so I had a chance to play with one of these over Christmas.

Horl-3-knife-sharpener-0238b67.jpg


Ooh - I want one. And they're rated the best sharpener on BBC Good Food Guide.

Then I saw the price, :eek: :eek: :eek:

So I bought one of these

anysharp-2cc0608.jpg


Amazon wants a tenner, but I found it for £4 on eBay, and our knives had never been sharper. Not that that's saying much, but I don't need to shave with them. At that price, I doubt it'll last very long, but I can buy an awful lot of replacements for the price of the top one.
Yes, the Anysharp works well, and you can get them anywhere. Ideal for the boat as they are small. They are aggressive, so I would not use it on your prize knives at home.
If you mean knifes, you can get basic coloured ones with a plastic sheath. Kuhn Rikon have decent blades, but you can get copies in supermarkets. A paring/veg one and a small cooks one should do for almost everything. I did get a larger cooks one, but didn't likely using it in the more confined space on board. The K.Rikon ones will last you forever.
 
a nice sharp knife for cooking on board would be nice.
For cooking I generally use Zwilling knives and two mid-range Japanese knives; all steel no ceramic. The Zwillings can be kept sharp enough with the steel rod

steel.jpg
The Japanese are a different story, they are a lot sharper -can horizontally cut a tomato simply placed on the table, without holding it with the hand- but more delicate, I used the 1000-3000-6000 stones for a while but got fed up it takes ages (and very expensive), too long for me anyway, so I now use the rod above and when needed I sharpen them with flat jewelers files (by memory numbers 2 and 3, higher numbers are mostly for polishing), works well.
I used straight razors for about 30years, now sharpening those was something: stones, sequence of different strops with different grain coloured pastes, happily it had to be done only once or twice a year; then final naked strop before use and what a pleasure to shave :) Unfortunately all carbon steel (apart from one Zwilling) and get quickly pitted on the boat
 
can horizontally cut a tomato simply placed on the table, without holding it with the hand
My Sabatier knives will happily do this too.
at about 30 degrees
This is the problem, it’s hard to maintain an angle so the edge ends up getting rounded. Ceramic sharpeners take out the guesswork entirely so the knife lasts longer and stays sharper than with a stone or a steel.
 
Fine Japanese Waterstones do the job properly. Gadgets are never that good. Plenty of videos on You Tube.
You keep that on your boat? You must be quite a chef !!
Can't agree about gadgets. Not clear if OP wants a knife or a sharpener, but he isnt going to be cooking for 8 hours a day, I will assume, so I can't see he needs much more than a decent basic knife or two and something simple to sharpen it with occasionally. With that he can prepare almost anything.
The 30cm fish filleting knife and the sous vide may be next month!
 
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