# Chef's Knife 15/20 electric sharpener



## Adrian (May 31, 2015)

I have one of these electric sharpeners at home, which I have used in the past to sharpen German knives that I don't have the time or inclination to put across the stones. 

In the restaurant I have about 200 non serrated steak knives, basically good quality laguiole copies, and they need some work. 

They are all stainless and I have no idea what the steel is. When we bought them, in a few batches, they were impressively sharp for customers, but now most of them are dull. The brigade have been suggesting the FOH team should steel them, which frankly is a stupid idea but that is what chefs learn in catering college. 

I have hand sharpened a couple and machine sharpened a couple. Hand sharpening is certainly better, but I work in the restaurant little enough as it is and if I machine sharpen I can delegate the job, which is basically a repetitive task that is quite simple, to one of the apprentices. Hand sharpening this quantity will take a long, long time. 

Any views guys on a sharpening production line?


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## Noodle Soup (May 31, 2015)

Using the Chef Choice sounds like a good idea to me. How sharp does a steak knife need to be? I resharpen mine by hand but I never put a lot of time into trying to hone the perfect edge on them.


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## Adrian (May 31, 2015)

The truth is steak knives get abused. Mainly by being used to cut against china plates, which is not a kind surface, and being banged together by FOH staff. 

There is a massive advantage to having them sharp - customers are impressed with both the knife _and_ the steak. It creates an added impression of tenderness and quality.

We started off using genuine Laguiole, but we had a bit of a problem with customers "forgetting" to give them back at the end of the meal. This led to a few embarrassing incidents, so now we train our staff to count the knives in and out. Seems ridiculous, I know. 

I suppose using the knife machine is a no brainer really. It can't do permanent harm and to be honest I don't want the knives razor sharp, just sharp enough.


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## Noodle Soup (Jun 1, 2015)

Even in Paris the Pakistani copies of Laguiole steak knives are more common than the real thing in most restaurants. I do sharpen my steak knives, I just don't spend a lot of time trying to hone them to razor edge perfection. A quick 800-1000 grit edge seems to work well enough.


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## Keith Sinclair (Jun 1, 2015)

I would do a couple on the electric sharpener to see the least amount you can to get a decent edge. Then show your apprentice that. Don't want to over do it on your 200 steak knives with an electric.

Agree customer likes to cut meat with something sharper than a butter knife. I have a half dozen cheap opinal carbons at home keep them sharp on a 1K edge for pork chops & steaks.


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## mhpr262 (Jun 6, 2015)

If you have that many knives to sharpen (and the house knives too) you might want to consider a belt sander, if possible one that also has a grinding disc that can be excanged against a cotton cloth buffing wheel.

I used to look down on sharpening on a belt sander (ruins the temper, inferior edge, whatever ...) but I recently tried out the sander I bought for thinning knives for sharpening and I must say it works really well if you know what you are doing (i.e. making sure the edge doesn't overheat).

It puts on a super clean looking, even bevel in seconds even with a fine 400 grit belt, it removes very little material because there is no mud from stones, so if you do it in direct sunlight you can actually see the burr forming as a tiny little glittery "fringe" at the edge and thus know exactly when you have hit the apex, and the bladefaces won't get scratched from abrasive particles in the mud. If you do not use much pressure and do quick passes there is no noticeable heating of the blade.

I deburr the edge with a few passes along a cotton cloth wheel loaded with rough polishing compound. It might work even better with finer compound and a felt wheel, haven't gotten around to trying it yet (my household has run out of dull knives , LOL). The bevel looks really cool after that, a matte "misty" finish with no visible scratches. Excellent sharpness, too, with that method.


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## Adrian (Jun 6, 2015)

Thanks for the input guys. I ended up getting my son on the case and he did 243 knives in 2 days using the electric sharpener, with a quick finish on stones. It was tedious and quite slow and if we do this again I will set up a belt sander. I have never considered that before - but I have never had to do so many in one go before. It is clear though that the Chef's Knife machine, though a good tool for what it does, is not up to volume work. Running it continuously is too much for it. 

He also did a few of the general brigade knives on the stones as well. Was able to get a far superior edge, but took quite a bit longer per knife. (He is 18 but first started sharpening knives in our kitchen at home when he was 7. We had a few cuts to begin with but he knows what he is doing now. )

The interesting thing for me was that for general everyday use, we reckoned that for a dullish blade, the best result was achieved with a green Naniwa 400, followed by finishing on a beige Naniwa 2000. Normally I would start with the 2000 and finish well beyond that with much finer grits and stropping. Obviously unnecessary for steak knives, but for general good quality chefs knives they were more than happy with the sharpness and edge retention. Slightly undermined my perfectionist tendencies.


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## Noodle Soup (Jun 6, 2015)

Chefs Choice does make some heavier duty professional kitchen models. I have about every model they make and have been generally happy with their performance but then I've never had as many knives to sharpen at one time as you did.


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## psfred (Jun 6, 2015)

With that many knives a belt grinder is definitely the way to go. Might ruin a couple before you get the hang of it, but mphr says, it's fast, gives a good edge, and isn't hard to do once you get a feel for it.

And I agree, highly polished sharp edges are wasted on steak knives, but the customers will appreciate the ease of use with the edge you can get quickly.

Peter


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## mhpr262 (Jun 7, 2015)

If you do get one, make sure it has an unsupported, "slack" part of the belt, that is super useful for putting on slightly convex bevels and blending various thinning marks and scrathes and lines into one smooth continous convex part.

This one here would be almost perfect, http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00BTYPKW4/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

except for the lack of a buffing wheel, but one can get an extra disc grinder for that, those things with the dual discs, one on each side that look like a stubby rigid car axle.

Btw it would be really hard to ruin a knife with a belt sander as long as you make sure it doesn't overheat. I have seen much worse from sharpening on a stone ...


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## Adrian (Jun 7, 2015)

Thanks. I have a heavy duty workshop belt sander for joinery. This is used for ripping off material mainly, prior to finishing. I will have to see if we can get suitably fine tungsten carbide belts to fit it.


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## gic (Jun 7, 2015)

You know the ken onion knife sharpener (http://www.worksharptools.com/knife-tool-sharpener-ken-onion-edition.html) is actually pretty good and pretty idiot proof, kind of like a cross between a chef's choice and a belt sander and much easier to use then a belt sander, not sure it is available in european current's though


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## Keith Sinclair (Jun 7, 2015)

mhpr262 said:


> If you do get one, make sure it has an unsupported, "slack" part of the belt, that is super useful for putting on slightly convex bevels and blending various thinning marks and scrathes and lines into one smooth continous convex part.
> 
> This one here would be almost perfect, http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00BTYPKW4/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20
> 
> ...



Good points Have had a Kalamazoo 1X42 for couple years. Use the slack part of belt for bevels, keep a tub of water next to the sander to dip the blade.


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## lobby (Jun 14, 2015)

FWIW I work in a high volume steak house (800 covers on a friday or saturday). I am not sure how many steak knives we have, but we do have one of those chef's choice machines that does a pretty acceptable job. Even doing it with that machine takes someone about 3 hours!


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