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Tool Talk: Knives, part 2
Now that you know what types of knife you might need, which particular ones should you buy? (If you're just coming in, you may want to read part 1 first.)
Four issues:
Metal
Stainless or carbon steel? Stainless doesn’t rust unless you work at it; carbon does unless you are careful. Other than that, there are no absolute differences. It is not true that stainless steel cannot be sharpened as well, for example, or that it doesn’t hold an edge, or anything like that. Which stainless alloy? That’s the question, and it’s not usually something an ordinary person can answer or even understand intelligently.
The basic point is that all steel is an alloy of iron and something(s). Any given alloy has certain properties, which can be more or less improved or manipulated by a knifemaker through the forging process.
So what to do?
I think the only reason to buy carbon steel is because you know for absolutely certain that this particular knife, made by this particular knifemaker, is extraordinarily special and worth the trouble. Hand-forging is extremely difficult with most stainless steel, and I am told that it is especially so with the sort of stainless that will produce a truly excellent knife. As a result, many of the really great hand knifemakers stick to carbon steel.
But top-quality mass-produced knives are not junk by any stretch of the imagination. Wusthof, Sabatier, Henckels, and the like make extremely high-quality knives, and they are stainless. Their edge-taking and -holding qualities are excellent.
So if you are into knives and don’t mind some extra work, and if you are willing to spend a fair chunk of change for a hand-forged knife from a really top-quality master, and that master uses only carbon steel, go ahead and buy carbon steel. If any one of these things isn’t true, buy stainless from a reputable knifemaker.
Edge
There are, to my knowledge, three kinds of blade: single-edged, double-edged, and serrated.
If you have a sheet of metal and you start grinding on one side of one face until you get an edge, you have a single-edged knife. This is how traditional Japanese cutlery is made, and it’s likely most familiar to you in the form of a chisel. Single-edged knives are relatively easy to sharpen, and they can take a durable, extremely sharp edge. When you cut with such a knife, the forward-back motion (like a saw) is very important: if you cut straight down, the knife will tend to slide a little bit in the way a chisel does. Single-edged knives are handed, meaning a lefty knife is the opposite of a righty knife.
If you have a sheet of metal and you grind evenly on both faces of one side, you produce a double-edged knife. This is how essentially all Western knives are made. Double-edged knives are slightly tricky to sharpen, but it’s not difficult. You can get away with a straight up-and-down motion when you chop if you must, but you are not using the knife efficiently.
Serrated knives replace the microscopic teeth of a normal edge with large, saw-like teeth. As a result they tear food rather than cut it. They are nearly impossible to sharpen at home, and you must saw rather than go up-and-down.
The only reason for buying a serrated knife (other than a steak knife) is to get something that will do a vaguely functional job for very little money, with no intention of spending any further time or effort on those knives. Ginsu Knife ads and the like make a lot of false claims: they do not cut tomatoes better than ordinary knives — they cut better than ordinary blunt knives. If you want very cheap knives and will not ever sharpen them, consider serrated. Bear in mind that if you cut yourself, you are going to have a nasty wound, because the knife will tear your flesh rather than cutting cleanly. There is no reason to own a serrated bread knife, either, except for cutting very soft bread: for crusty bread, use a really sharp workhorse knife (chef’s knife, cleaver, deba). But if you hand-cut sandwich bread a lot, a bread knife is handy.
There is no significant advantage to single-edge knives except for some quite peculiar Japanese usages, notably making sashimi, shaving daikon, or filleting with a really big knife. The sashimi thing works because you can sharpen the single edge of the yanagiba to a terrifying thinness in a way that would be quite difficult if it were double-edged. But how often are you going to cut sashimi yourself, honestly?
I would strongly recommend double-edged knives for everything unless you have decided to learn the Japanese knife system.
Brand
Since in the French or Chinese system you only really need one top-quality knife — your workhorse knife — you should plan to buy high-quality equipment there. All in all, you can get away with a mediocre cheap paring knife. Use the savings toward a good workhorse knife.
Working in the European system, you should expect that a high-quality chef’s knife is going to cost $80 minimum. Plan on $100, hope for $80, and you might get lucky with a deep sale. So how do you know what’s good? Simple: what normally costs $100?
The baselines here should be the famous ones: Wusthof, Henckels, Sabatier. If you buy another brand, check in advance that you are getting at least equal quality. Buy from a knife dealer, e.g. Stoddard’s or the like, or a very serious kitchenware shop or department: if the dealer doesn’t seem to know all that much about the different knives and styles, walk out.
If you are buying at this level, you get what you pay for so long as you don’t do something stupid. If a knife costs much less than its competition, you need a very good explanation of why, and preferably independent verification that this explanation is valid. If a knife costs much more than the competition, don’t buy it: if you are getting a whole lot out of this column, you have no reason whatsoever to spend a lot of extra money. The only reason to spend more than baseline is if you have some very specific requirement that is abnormal and requires a specialty item. Don’t spend extra because a knife looks cool, has watered/Damascus-style steel, or has the name of some famous TV chef blazoned on the side. If you are a professional with extremely specific demands, having to do with not only the way you cut but also how often in your particular business, why are you reading a column like this? Just to conclude here, a paring knife you can buy pretty cheap; you don’t need the Wusthof and so on, because 90% of what you’d do with a paring knife can also be done with a chef’s knife. Feel free, though: they’re under $50.
If you go the Chinese knife route, it’s easy. For a cleaver, buy what Barbara Tropp recommended: the Dexter/Russell Chinese Chef’s Cleaver, 8-inch blade. It’ll cost about $55, and is spectacularly good. Get a top-quality paring knife for everything else, which will cost a little less; you need it here more than in the French system, because a Chinese cleaver is not a good device for a good deal of precision work.
You can wait on a boning knife. When you decide you need one, ask yourself how often you are going to use it. Are you happy using your other two knives for just about everything, and now you need a boning knife because it’s kind of a pain to fillet fish without one? Or do you constantly feel the need for a thin, flexible knife considerably longer than your paring knife? In the former case, I’d buy the lowest-end boning knife made by one of the big brands (Wusthof etc.). They have a range of styles, including some that are economy knives. If you don’t use the knife a lot, you won’t really encounter the down-sides of such knives. If on the other hand you really need a boning knife all the time, for instance if you are constantly preparing fish and the like, you should expect to pay another $75 or so for it, and in 6 months you will be glad you did.
For Japanese knives, get them from a longstanding knifemaker who is not making a big deal about advertising in the West. I recommend Aritsugu: their knives are wonderful, and you get precisely what you pay for, in the sense that their cheaper knives are excellent and their very expensive ones are spectacular. They couldn’t care less about Western chefs thinking they are cool: a very large percentage of the top chefs in Japan buy most or all of their knives at Aritsugu. Expect to pay $125 per knife, minimum, for the basic three. You can order online, and they ship.
Design and Size
At the top end, every knife is going to be full-tanged, which is the one absolute point. That means the piece of metal that is the blade continues all the way back through the handle. In some cases the blade will be riveted, or the whole knife will be drop-forged in one piece (like Global knives), or whatever. Doesn’t matter objectively: the only point is that the blade metal must continue all the way through the handle, so the blade cannot fall out or shift around.
Beyond this, everything is subjective, but you should know the downside of everything usually pushed as “why you must buy this knife.”
Less heavy, so it’s less tiring. Not true, at base. A light knife is easy to lift, but more work to cut with, because gravity doesn’t help you in the cut. A heavy knife is hard to lift, but you just put it on the food and it cuts by itself, no work.
Smaller, so it’s safer. Absolutely untrue. The most dangerous knife you own is your paring knife. It is small and sharp, and tends to slip — and when it slips, the point is very close to your hand. Compare an axe to a hatchet: if you swing at a log and miss, a hatchet continues into your leg, but an axe hits the ground.
Thin-bladed, so it’s sharper. Crap. The question is how it’s sharpened, not the shape of the main blade. There are various reasons for making and purchasing a thick or a thin blade, but basic sharpness is not among them. A classic Japanese deba bocho is thicker than any normal Western-style knife except maybe a cleaver, but it is (or should be) frighteningly sharp.
Dishwasher-safe. I find this difficult to credit. If the knife is sharpened sufficiently that it will really cut as it should, the cutting edge itself will be microscopically thin. I don’t care what it’s made of, if it’s that microscopically thin it will not respond well to being banged around randomly in a dishwasher. As a matter of principle I hold to the old rule that very hot water is also not good for knives, the theory being that the expansion and contraction is undesirable.
Never-dull. Read, “never sharpen.” As in, “you could never in a million years sharpen this knife.” The stainless alloy here is so hard that it cannot be sharpened on anything resembling home equipment. If you are happy with the blade they give you, okay, but chances are it’s not sharp enough, and you won’t be able to do anything about it.
Ceramic. Warning! A ceramic knife is likely to be very, very sharp, but also delicate. Treat it the way you’d treat a yanagiba or other sashimi knife: it should never, ever touch anything that isn’t already passably soft. Never fillet a fish with it: if you do it imperfectly, the knife will scrape on bones. You may not see the damage, but it’s there, and at some point you will suddenly lose part of your blade. At which point, throw it away: you can’t sharpen it yourself.
What do I think? Gee, I’m glad you asked.
Chef’s Knife
Take a baseline: 8" blade, standard design, from Wusthof or Henckels, with the wooden handles. Go to a serious knife shop and take hold of this thing with a normal grip. (Note: if they won’t let you do this, walk out. You cannot buy a knife unless you know what it feels like, and if they don’t know this or don’t care, you don’t want them to get your business.)
Test #1
Hold the knife the normal way: three fingers curled around handle, thumb on blade face, forefinger on the spine of the blade or the opposite face, as you prefer. Now lift the knife and gently swing it down as though chopping straight through something. Feel the weight carefully. Do it again, eyes closed, if you trust yourself. Here’s the question: where does the knife want to strike? If the tip wants to hit first, the knife is too heavy: you will work too hard lifting it. If the heel (where your hand is) wants to hit first, the knife is too light: you will have to muscle the blade down. If it naturally, easily wants to strike in the middle of the blade, it’s right.
(Note: that’s right for you. Your arm, your hand, your strength, your habits.)
Test #2
We know the weight, but is the length right? Hold the knife out, your arm just a little bit bent. Now raise and drop the blade point with just your wrist, fairly rapidly, a few times. Turn your hand 90 degrees to the right, so your knuckles are down, and do it again. Here’s the question: how hard are you working? Unfortunately, the ideal answer is the middle way. You should be working, but not too hard. If you can whip it up and down easy, it’s too short. If you’re actually having to put some labor into moving it, it’s too long. It should sort of have a mind of its own, but be tractable, if you see what I mean. If you shift to a longer knife, you may have to try a thinner style to eliminate the extra weight, and vice versa, and so on. But the differences are pretty fine: just go with what feels best at this point.
Test #3
Almost certainly, you are now done. But just on the off-chance, do the same two tests with a few more knives of the same size and basic design from other brands and lines. It’s just possible that you would be best served by a knife that is just a hair thinner or thicker than usual. They should all cost just about the same, give or take. It’s not small change, so take a little time to make a confident, happy decision.
Important
With the first test especially, it is worthwhile trying the same things with a baseline santoku from the same brand and line if it’s available, especially if you are a smallish woman and/or have small hands. This is not a matter of strength: it’s a matter of balance and shape with respect to the cook’s hand. Do not be swayed by anything but your hand: pay no attention to what some famous chef tells you, or a salesman, or whoever. How does it feel? You might prefer a santoku, but you might well prefer an 8" chef’s knife, and the two are emphatically not the same thing.
Final Note
In about 3-5 years, reevaluate. Do those tests over again in a knife shop, and ignore anything you are told by the salesperson. Now what do you think? My strong impression, from anecdotal evidence and my personal experience, is that you are going to want a bigger knife. The first time around, you were swayed: it seemed heavy, it seemed expensive, it seemed dangerous. Now you know your hand and arm, and you know what’s right for you. There are, of course, those who bought a knife too big, for whatever reason, and now realize that what they want is something a bit more handy and wieldy. In any event, check and be sure you’re happy. If you really cut down to just a couple of knives and used them constantly for everything, you will know why it is a perfectly sane and good thing to spend $100 for a knife that you love.
Paring Knife, Boning Knife, Etc.
Buy the most common length, the most common design, and get used to it. They are what they are. Adapt yourself to them. Oh — and pay attention to Jacques Pépin, because you can use a paring knife very differently from what you probably think. Keep it sharp.
Conclusion
You now know (or rather, can work out for yourself, which is much more important) what knives you ought to own, what you should pay for them if you are buying them, and so on. But what then? I keep making noises about sharpening, maintenance, and all that. How? Read on to part 3!
Four issues:
- Metal
- Edge
- Brand
- Design/size
Metal
Stainless or carbon steel? Stainless doesn’t rust unless you work at it; carbon does unless you are careful. Other than that, there are no absolute differences. It is not true that stainless steel cannot be sharpened as well, for example, or that it doesn’t hold an edge, or anything like that. Which stainless alloy? That’s the question, and it’s not usually something an ordinary person can answer or even understand intelligently.
The basic point is that all steel is an alloy of iron and something(s). Any given alloy has certain properties, which can be more or less improved or manipulated by a knifemaker through the forging process.
So what to do?
I think the only reason to buy carbon steel is because you know for absolutely certain that this particular knife, made by this particular knifemaker, is extraordinarily special and worth the trouble. Hand-forging is extremely difficult with most stainless steel, and I am told that it is especially so with the sort of stainless that will produce a truly excellent knife. As a result, many of the really great hand knifemakers stick to carbon steel.
But top-quality mass-produced knives are not junk by any stretch of the imagination. Wusthof, Sabatier, Henckels, and the like make extremely high-quality knives, and they are stainless. Their edge-taking and -holding qualities are excellent.
So if you are into knives and don’t mind some extra work, and if you are willing to spend a fair chunk of change for a hand-forged knife from a really top-quality master, and that master uses only carbon steel, go ahead and buy carbon steel. If any one of these things isn’t true, buy stainless from a reputable knifemaker.
Edge
There are, to my knowledge, three kinds of blade: single-edged, double-edged, and serrated.
If you have a sheet of metal and you start grinding on one side of one face until you get an edge, you have a single-edged knife. This is how traditional Japanese cutlery is made, and it’s likely most familiar to you in the form of a chisel. Single-edged knives are relatively easy to sharpen, and they can take a durable, extremely sharp edge. When you cut with such a knife, the forward-back motion (like a saw) is very important: if you cut straight down, the knife will tend to slide a little bit in the way a chisel does. Single-edged knives are handed, meaning a lefty knife is the opposite of a righty knife.
If you have a sheet of metal and you grind evenly on both faces of one side, you produce a double-edged knife. This is how essentially all Western knives are made. Double-edged knives are slightly tricky to sharpen, but it’s not difficult. You can get away with a straight up-and-down motion when you chop if you must, but you are not using the knife efficiently.
Serrated knives replace the microscopic teeth of a normal edge with large, saw-like teeth. As a result they tear food rather than cut it. They are nearly impossible to sharpen at home, and you must saw rather than go up-and-down.
The only reason for buying a serrated knife (other than a steak knife) is to get something that will do a vaguely functional job for very little money, with no intention of spending any further time or effort on those knives. Ginsu Knife ads and the like make a lot of false claims: they do not cut tomatoes better than ordinary knives — they cut better than ordinary blunt knives. If you want very cheap knives and will not ever sharpen them, consider serrated. Bear in mind that if you cut yourself, you are going to have a nasty wound, because the knife will tear your flesh rather than cutting cleanly. There is no reason to own a serrated bread knife, either, except for cutting very soft bread: for crusty bread, use a really sharp workhorse knife (chef’s knife, cleaver, deba). But if you hand-cut sandwich bread a lot, a bread knife is handy.
There is no significant advantage to single-edge knives except for some quite peculiar Japanese usages, notably making sashimi, shaving daikon, or filleting with a really big knife. The sashimi thing works because you can sharpen the single edge of the yanagiba to a terrifying thinness in a way that would be quite difficult if it were double-edged. But how often are you going to cut sashimi yourself, honestly?
I would strongly recommend double-edged knives for everything unless you have decided to learn the Japanese knife system.
Brand
Since in the French or Chinese system you only really need one top-quality knife — your workhorse knife — you should plan to buy high-quality equipment there. All in all, you can get away with a mediocre cheap paring knife. Use the savings toward a good workhorse knife.
Working in the European system, you should expect that a high-quality chef’s knife is going to cost $80 minimum. Plan on $100, hope for $80, and you might get lucky with a deep sale. So how do you know what’s good? Simple: what normally costs $100?
The baselines here should be the famous ones: Wusthof, Henckels, Sabatier. If you buy another brand, check in advance that you are getting at least equal quality. Buy from a knife dealer, e.g. Stoddard’s or the like, or a very serious kitchenware shop or department: if the dealer doesn’t seem to know all that much about the different knives and styles, walk out.
If you are buying at this level, you get what you pay for so long as you don’t do something stupid. If a knife costs much less than its competition, you need a very good explanation of why, and preferably independent verification that this explanation is valid. If a knife costs much more than the competition, don’t buy it: if you are getting a whole lot out of this column, you have no reason whatsoever to spend a lot of extra money. The only reason to spend more than baseline is if you have some very specific requirement that is abnormal and requires a specialty item. Don’t spend extra because a knife looks cool, has watered/Damascus-style steel, or has the name of some famous TV chef blazoned on the side. If you are a professional with extremely specific demands, having to do with not only the way you cut but also how often in your particular business, why are you reading a column like this? Just to conclude here, a paring knife you can buy pretty cheap; you don’t need the Wusthof and so on, because 90% of what you’d do with a paring knife can also be done with a chef’s knife. Feel free, though: they’re under $50.
If you go the Chinese knife route, it’s easy. For a cleaver, buy what Barbara Tropp recommended: the Dexter/Russell Chinese Chef’s Cleaver, 8-inch blade. It’ll cost about $55, and is spectacularly good. Get a top-quality paring knife for everything else, which will cost a little less; you need it here more than in the French system, because a Chinese cleaver is not a good device for a good deal of precision work.
You can wait on a boning knife. When you decide you need one, ask yourself how often you are going to use it. Are you happy using your other two knives for just about everything, and now you need a boning knife because it’s kind of a pain to fillet fish without one? Or do you constantly feel the need for a thin, flexible knife considerably longer than your paring knife? In the former case, I’d buy the lowest-end boning knife made by one of the big brands (Wusthof etc.). They have a range of styles, including some that are economy knives. If you don’t use the knife a lot, you won’t really encounter the down-sides of such knives. If on the other hand you really need a boning knife all the time, for instance if you are constantly preparing fish and the like, you should expect to pay another $75 or so for it, and in 6 months you will be glad you did.
For Japanese knives, get them from a longstanding knifemaker who is not making a big deal about advertising in the West. I recommend Aritsugu: their knives are wonderful, and you get precisely what you pay for, in the sense that their cheaper knives are excellent and their very expensive ones are spectacular. They couldn’t care less about Western chefs thinking they are cool: a very large percentage of the top chefs in Japan buy most or all of their knives at Aritsugu. Expect to pay $125 per knife, minimum, for the basic three. You can order online, and they ship.
Design and Size
At the top end, every knife is going to be full-tanged, which is the one absolute point. That means the piece of metal that is the blade continues all the way back through the handle. In some cases the blade will be riveted, or the whole knife will be drop-forged in one piece (like Global knives), or whatever. Doesn’t matter objectively: the only point is that the blade metal must continue all the way through the handle, so the blade cannot fall out or shift around.
Beyond this, everything is subjective, but you should know the downside of everything usually pushed as “why you must buy this knife.”
Less heavy, so it’s less tiring. Not true, at base. A light knife is easy to lift, but more work to cut with, because gravity doesn’t help you in the cut. A heavy knife is hard to lift, but you just put it on the food and it cuts by itself, no work.
Smaller, so it’s safer. Absolutely untrue. The most dangerous knife you own is your paring knife. It is small and sharp, and tends to slip — and when it slips, the point is very close to your hand. Compare an axe to a hatchet: if you swing at a log and miss, a hatchet continues into your leg, but an axe hits the ground.
Thin-bladed, so it’s sharper. Crap. The question is how it’s sharpened, not the shape of the main blade. There are various reasons for making and purchasing a thick or a thin blade, but basic sharpness is not among them. A classic Japanese deba bocho is thicker than any normal Western-style knife except maybe a cleaver, but it is (or should be) frighteningly sharp.
Dishwasher-safe. I find this difficult to credit. If the knife is sharpened sufficiently that it will really cut as it should, the cutting edge itself will be microscopically thin. I don’t care what it’s made of, if it’s that microscopically thin it will not respond well to being banged around randomly in a dishwasher. As a matter of principle I hold to the old rule that very hot water is also not good for knives, the theory being that the expansion and contraction is undesirable.
Never-dull. Read, “never sharpen.” As in, “you could never in a million years sharpen this knife.” The stainless alloy here is so hard that it cannot be sharpened on anything resembling home equipment. If you are happy with the blade they give you, okay, but chances are it’s not sharp enough, and you won’t be able to do anything about it.
Ceramic. Warning! A ceramic knife is likely to be very, very sharp, but also delicate. Treat it the way you’d treat a yanagiba or other sashimi knife: it should never, ever touch anything that isn’t already passably soft. Never fillet a fish with it: if you do it imperfectly, the knife will scrape on bones. You may not see the damage, but it’s there, and at some point you will suddenly lose part of your blade. At which point, throw it away: you can’t sharpen it yourself.
What do I think? Gee, I’m glad you asked.
Chef’s Knife
Take a baseline: 8" blade, standard design, from Wusthof or Henckels, with the wooden handles. Go to a serious knife shop and take hold of this thing with a normal grip. (Note: if they won’t let you do this, walk out. You cannot buy a knife unless you know what it feels like, and if they don’t know this or don’t care, you don’t want them to get your business.)
Test #1
Hold the knife the normal way: three fingers curled around handle, thumb on blade face, forefinger on the spine of the blade or the opposite face, as you prefer. Now lift the knife and gently swing it down as though chopping straight through something. Feel the weight carefully. Do it again, eyes closed, if you trust yourself. Here’s the question: where does the knife want to strike? If the tip wants to hit first, the knife is too heavy: you will work too hard lifting it. If the heel (where your hand is) wants to hit first, the knife is too light: you will have to muscle the blade down. If it naturally, easily wants to strike in the middle of the blade, it’s right.
(Note: that’s right for you. Your arm, your hand, your strength, your habits.)
Test #2
We know the weight, but is the length right? Hold the knife out, your arm just a little bit bent. Now raise and drop the blade point with just your wrist, fairly rapidly, a few times. Turn your hand 90 degrees to the right, so your knuckles are down, and do it again. Here’s the question: how hard are you working? Unfortunately, the ideal answer is the middle way. You should be working, but not too hard. If you can whip it up and down easy, it’s too short. If you’re actually having to put some labor into moving it, it’s too long. It should sort of have a mind of its own, but be tractable, if you see what I mean. If you shift to a longer knife, you may have to try a thinner style to eliminate the extra weight, and vice versa, and so on. But the differences are pretty fine: just go with what feels best at this point.
Test #3
Almost certainly, you are now done. But just on the off-chance, do the same two tests with a few more knives of the same size and basic design from other brands and lines. It’s just possible that you would be best served by a knife that is just a hair thinner or thicker than usual. They should all cost just about the same, give or take. It’s not small change, so take a little time to make a confident, happy decision.
Important
With the first test especially, it is worthwhile trying the same things with a baseline santoku from the same brand and line if it’s available, especially if you are a smallish woman and/or have small hands. This is not a matter of strength: it’s a matter of balance and shape with respect to the cook’s hand. Do not be swayed by anything but your hand: pay no attention to what some famous chef tells you, or a salesman, or whoever. How does it feel? You might prefer a santoku, but you might well prefer an 8" chef’s knife, and the two are emphatically not the same thing.
Final Note
In about 3-5 years, reevaluate. Do those tests over again in a knife shop, and ignore anything you are told by the salesperson. Now what do you think? My strong impression, from anecdotal evidence and my personal experience, is that you are going to want a bigger knife. The first time around, you were swayed: it seemed heavy, it seemed expensive, it seemed dangerous. Now you know your hand and arm, and you know what’s right for you. There are, of course, those who bought a knife too big, for whatever reason, and now realize that what they want is something a bit more handy and wieldy. In any event, check and be sure you’re happy. If you really cut down to just a couple of knives and used them constantly for everything, you will know why it is a perfectly sane and good thing to spend $100 for a knife that you love.
Paring Knife, Boning Knife, Etc.
Buy the most common length, the most common design, and get used to it. They are what they are. Adapt yourself to them. Oh — and pay attention to Jacques Pépin, because you can use a paring knife very differently from what you probably think. Keep it sharp.
Conclusion
You now know (or rather, can work out for yourself, which is much more important) what knives you ought to own, what you should pay for them if you are buying them, and so on. But what then? I keep making noises about sharpening, maintenance, and all that. How? Read on to part 3!
