KNIFE SHARPENING
As for the best way sharpening of knives, my friend travelled from Denver to Cleveland to take a knife sharpening course from Steve Bottorff ( http://sharpeningmadeeasy.com/ ). He has his book and ended up purchasing an Edge Pro professional model and a bunch of stones. Steve really knew his stuff. Check out his page for lots of useful information:
http://sharpeningmadeeasy.com/infopage.htm
and the following exceptionally informative page from Ward at:
https://forums.egullet.org/topic/26036-knife-maintenance-and-sharpening/
Chad also wrote an exhaustive book on knives and knife sharpening, which is definitely worth purchasing:
“An Edge in the Kitchen: The Ultimate Guide to Kitchen Knives — How to Buy Them, Keep Them Razor Sharp, and Use Them Like a Pro”
My friend bought the Edge Pro after he read what Steve and Chad had to say about it. He also likes the Mac Knife Ceramic honing rod. Here’s HOW TO USE A CERAMIC KNIFE SHARPENING ROD:
For serious sharpening, I opted to use the method recommended by a legendary knife legend, R.L. Dozier, a student of the famous Bob Loveless. The set up cost a little over $100 in 2017 prices, versus $250 for the Edge Pro, but that is not why I recommend it. He recommends DMT diamond stones, coarse then fine, followed by a leather strop with fine polishing compound added to it (heating it with a hair dryer makes it easier to apply), because it he said that they didn’t know what sharp was, until they started this method at their shop. That is a pretty big testimonial, coming from one of the elite hunting knife makers of our time. The DMT blade aligner, helps to get the correct angle and keep it. See https://youtu.be/NS5S0YLYA74 for Dozier’s method of sharpening on DMT diamond stones, which is the only one I have found to be both very easy and very effective, then followed with the ceramic rod and the leather strop. I like to use a sharpie marker to mark the blade so you can ensure you are getting the correct angle and coverage to your sharpening passes, which are lightly made across the diamond stone.
For carbon knives such some of my cowboy knives which are not used for food preparation, I like to coat the blade after sharpening with a little Renaissance Micro-Crystalline Wax Polish (65 ml) which we order from Amazon, and then lightly polish, which adds a rustproof barrier, but it isn’t food safe, so wipe the blade well before using for food.
