Brad Teaches You How to Sharpen Kitchen Knives

Huh? Knives out?

[ominous music]

No, what is that?

Hey guys [mumbles] It's Alive

we're gonna be doing one of my favorite activities,

knife sharpening, right?

Oh, I got the good one, I got the big boy here.

I got my favorite knife sharpening set,

so we're gonna be using whetstones,

and I'm gonna show you how to do it.

To the sink [mumbles].

[upbeat music]

[beeps] No we're not going to the sink yet, false alarm.

There's a lot of different ways to sharpen a knife, okay.

And as the great Bob Kramer once told me,

he's a knife maker out in Washington,

This ain't necessarily alive, but it's got energy.

Watching that start to finish,

if that don't make you feel alive.

I wanted to say something I forgot,

about like I know this isn't alive,

but making knives you know

if that don't make you feel alive.

I mean I know it's not alive.

This isn't exactly alive.

If making a high-performance knife like this,

if that don't make you feel alive then we can't help you.

Yeah I actually made a knife with him,

check out the episode, swipe down or up.

There's no wrong way, necessarily.

There's a lot of different ways to do it.

If someone likes to go like this,

then someone likes to go like that,

whatever works as long as you're doing it correctly.

We got a bridge, so this holds our stones,

which goes in over the sink, which is really convenient,

because A, we need water,

water's the lubrication in this process.

So the range you can go anywhere from

let's just say 400, you can probably even go lower.

400 being you know it's just like sandpaper,

the lower the number, the more coarse the grit.

The higher the finer, so 400 real coarse.

You're removing a lot of material, you're cutting it.

10000, which is what we'll finish on,

you're polishing man, you're not removing a lot of material.

And you know, you can't skip steps, you can't rush things.

So you wanna make sure you need to do what you need to do

on the 400 and on the 1000, because if you don't

and you try to just rush into the fun part, the polishing,

you're not going to have a very sharp knife.

We'll get into that.

Quick little test, this knife ain't dull,

but look, it's having a hard time push cutting, right?

You could slide cut,

most knives can do a slide cut if it's not garbage,

but if you look real close,

that cut is kind of, there's like little tears, right?

Can you see that?

As it's cutting it's like tearing,

because it's not super, super sharp.

To start off I figured

we would make this knife a little dull.

Okay, I got this thing here,

it has nothing to do with sharpening knives,

but actually taking care of your stones.

It's also really good at dulling your knives.

So this is probably making a lot of people cringe,

but we have a nice little edge on there,

I'm just gonna [groans]

oh that's not good, listen to that.

[beeps]

Yeah, that's not very good for your blade.

I mean, we're still kind of sharp,

but it's 'cause it had a good edge on here,

but we did some damage, okay?

Damage has been done.

Uncle Johnny Barge a knife,

he decided it'd be cute to kinda like,

you know, shave off a sixteenth of an inch

on the tile he was redoing your bathroom with or something.

Right, Johnny? [coughs]

So we mimic that.

So boom, we got this stone right here.

400 grit, it's our cutter, ready to go.

we're removing material.

After 400, 1000, 5000, 10000, 10000's super fine

and just because you thought that was it [laughs]

you gonna bring it to the next level,

that shave your freaking face, not advised.

You wanna get some leather, it's called stropping.

Just like back in the day, when you go to the barber shop,

and you know they have that piece of leather

with their straightedge you know

and they're with their razors,

and they're stropping their leather,

making it real nice and sharp, that's what they're doing.

And this is nice, 'cause you're over water,

you got a little water right here, you're ready to go.

So look I get that nice and wet.

And then this is adjustable too.

Okay now we're not going nowhere boom, we're in there, nice.

A good rule of thumb,

the wonderful Bob Kramer taught me one time,

if you're unsure of how what your angle should be

it's the back,

how do you describe that,

the back edge of a book of matches.

That thick part of a book of matches,

if you were to put that under here,

that's the perfect angle.

And every knife's a little different.

And everyone's gonna do this a little differently.

Don't start on your favorite knife

or your most expensive knife,

get a run of the mill knife that has decent steel

so you're not beating yourself up with that.

And put in some time, get good at it,

get comfortable with it

and then jump into a knife that matters or something to you.

So for here, and you wanna do even strokes.

Whatever way you do it, you do 10

and then you wanna do 10 on the other side.

Always work in mirrors.

So I go up and then I also go down.

That's how I like, I rock it like that.

You wanna make sure you're getting the tip

and also the whole, all the way to the heel.

And then flip, same thing.

[knife scraping]

And always stop and look at what you're doing.

You're looking for consistent cuts, okay?

You can kinda see where it's starting to grind,

it lost that [mumbles] and now it's getting real,

you just wanted to make sure if you were laying it flat,

you see how it's a little steeper here,

that means I'm dropping it a little flatter on the heel.

You want to just try to contain this

as consistent as possible.

And in this first stage is where

you really wanna get that like wire peel, that wire edge.

So when you're looking [mumbles]

under a microscope, if you were sharpening this,

you're cutting you're removing,

you're cutting you're removing on one side,

and then it kinda rolls the edge a little.

And then you cut it and remove that rolls off.

Eventually that wire edge will come off,

and that's a good indicator that you have done

as much as you need to in this early stone.

[knife scraping]

You wanna make sure you're pushing.

Okay it's not a real light thing, you are removing material,

You are essentially sanding metal, alright.

So I forget the poundage, I should have refreshed my memory,

but you can, I should look it up, damn it.

I think it was something like 10 pounds or something.

Let me look on my phone, I don't know the password for that.

Hold on, let me just look it up.

[calming music]

Oh, old Kramer pops up.

Old Bobby Kramer himself, master blade smith.

You're damn right.

Okay, so he's saying apply around

six to eight pounds of pressure.

So what he was saying,

if you don't know what that feels like,

here we'll get Andy's.

Andy, I'm gonna borrow your scale, thanks.

[siren blaring] I'll come over here, this is fun.

As you put your knife on there

like you were gonna sharpen it and then push.

How much six is, six to eight, just so you know.

[Cameraman] Thanks Bob.

Yeah thanks Bob, that's actually a really good tip.

And I like to after a couple of rotations

I like to put a little more water on my stone,

rinse the knife as you go.

You will spend the most time on this stone,

and that's why I think the biggest mistake people make

when they try sharpening their knives is that

hey listen, it's fun to jump to the next stone

and try to get that thing that's gonna cut like a razor,

but you can't rush this

because If you don't do this to the correct level,

all that that's gonna do is highlight

your poorly sharpened knife.

So until you get that wire roll, that wire edge,

that little roll,

you're not done with the 400.

So you can kinda even see it on this edge,

you see where it's starting to pick up that black.

With a microscope you could see it a lot more.

So you're seeing how the water has changed a little alright,

we have all that color.

Now that's part the abrasion stone itself,

but you're also like I said, we're also sanding steel.

So you're getting real fine powder of steel coming off too.

Which is also part of how we take care of our stones,

and I'll show you that later, how you can get some of that

embedded steel out of your stone.

And this isn't something where you just put some music on

and black out and start going away,

you don't have to go a million miles an hour,

okay, it's like a controlled motion.

It's like doing push-ups, okay?

You're better off doing 10 really good ones

than 50 sloppy ones.

That's actually great advice for this.

[knife scraping]

that's catching my skin a little bit right there,

there's that little roll and that's what we want.

Alright, so that's our 400, next up is the 1000.

Same exact thing, just a different grit.

I'll do reps of 10 on each side times three.

And I'll check it after that.

And I like to carry that all the way through to the 10000.

So what we're really changing here,

we're not changing technique, we're not changing pressure,

we're only changing the coarseness of the stone,

and the stone is the variable in this.

[knife scraping]

And again you can go one motion if you want,

whatever is comfortable for you.

But a good starting point is you put a little pressure here,

and on your handle you hold like that,

fingers on your tip, start at the bottom tip

and work your way up to the opposite.

[calm music]

Yeah I mean as you're sharpening with this,

you know, I've cut myself sharpening,

but it's mostly things with finger placement

and like you don't even really know

Oh [beeps] sorry hold on.

[beeps] Just find something

that you're comfortable with gliding.

[knife scraping]

Yeah. Get some.

Then we're gonna jump into the next stone,

next stone being 5000.

And again, less cutting, more of a polish.

Oh that feels good, look at that.

You can see, first draw.

Again, sounds different, feels way different,

it's like you're sliding on glass.

Less [imitating scraping] and more [imitating sliding]

even less, you know, kind of a bad example.

So here we're just gonna get into the polish, this is 5000.

Switching to the old 10000, it's like glass you know.

It's our last one before the leather.

You wanna use as much of the stone as possible.

You don't wanna work one little spot.

This is actually a good tip.

See a good thing, sometimes you see stones

will have bellies in it,

or someone gets, they comfortable on one side.

It's all about having a nice flat stone.

So I like to try to use as much of the stone as possible.

So here we go, nice mirror edge, we're in pretty good shape.

And that's really looking and stopping and looking

at what you're doing, progress along the way,

is really how you get better at it.

Where you can kinda grade yourself.

Morocco! Hey speaking of, we've got probably only two people

I feel comfortable sharpening knives--

I appreciate that, man.

In this kitchen.

I won't ask who the other one is.

It's me.

[laughing] Oh, okay.

Well we brought this all the way up to 10000,

which is about as polished as you need to be.

I'm gonna show these folks--

Most people don't go to 10000.

10000's a lot, but recommended if you wanna geek out.

I mean, you don't have to do 10000.

5000 will get you there.

5000, 6000, you're okay.

Finish on leather?

Yeah. Game changer.

Finish on leather.

So that's where we're at-- Big time.

I'm gonna show some folks about the leather strop.

I feel like the leather strop,

I mean honestly like if you take one thing away from this--

[Brad] It's the strop.

It's like the strop takes you that last ten percent.

Oh I'm not shaving, I'm not sure if it really worked--

To razors.

And it's like [mumbles] oh yeah.

And it really does and that's why I made the joke before

about the old barber running it on the strop,

the razor, before?

It was for a reason.

Before the hipsters made it cool.

If you're gonna shave with the Bowie knife--

Oh you're stropping.

Like in predator, you're stropping for that.

Oh Rambo stropped.

Oh, Rambo stropped, for sure.

[laughing]

Thanks Morocco.

Speaking of strop, no water okay, only thing different,

when I was going like this and coming back,

no, no, no, big no no, you'll cut the leather,

this is a hundred percent, one direction

and that's edge away

from you never cutting into this leather.

Woof!

Now this knife, crazy sharp, nice mirrored edge.

Now watch, it'll cut that paper way better.

This should just drop and cut.

Way cleaner, this should be good enough

to take the hair right off the arm.

Shall we, for the sake of science?

We'll do this patch.

[Gaby] Can you guess who I am?

What are you doing, crazy?

Don't show this.

Kids, don't do that at home.

Ewww.

Sharp enough to shave the hair off your arm,

not a problem.

Not bad actually, I've had razors that freaking cut worse.

Who do I look like?

Gaby, my God, you look like the tin man.

Yes, that's why I put this jacket on!

You nailed it, Gabriela.

Thank you, this is gonna be my Halloween costume, bye!

Bye Gaby, Halloween?

Halloween is coming up.

The problem is when you're video's gonna come out.

So, might as well.

Thanks Gaby.

Don't try that at home, I've done that a thousand times,

but look at that, clean shave, hold on.

I didn't cut myself but it like

Look at that, pretty smooth man.

Look at that.

That's disgusting.

[beeps] That's it man, done.

Make a knife from grinding it on stone,

to shaving the hair right off your [mumbles]

like a freaking baby's butt.

[slapping] Yeah baby.

Oh, and again, you got your nice knives,

you got some nice stones,

you spend some time getting good at sharpening, okay,

but this whole time you and Mickey,

or you and Susie or whatever you're doing,

wherever you live, wait I don't know.

[mumbles] you've got some roommates, okay,

you don't wanna just go throwing this in your junk drawer.

Banging in there with the rest of the knives.

It's gonna damage the knife.

What I make is little Sayas, little wooden covers, okay.

Easy, you can get them, 3dotwooddesign.com.

[bell rings] Instagram at 3dotwooddesign.

And we'll make one for you a custom.

But little sayas or a nice leather knife roll

or if you're in the house

I like the little magnet strips okay.

Oh you got it up on the wall,

clink and it just magnet sticks right to it.

Some of them are wood, you know.

3dotwooddesign.

Some of those are wood, where you'll get a chunk of wood

with a veneer over it of wood and the magnet's behind it.

You put that on your wall, real pretty.

Clink, you throw your blades on there nice.

That's knife sharpening man.

And again, there's ways I could do better at this.

Is this 100% sharp as hell? Yeah.

Good enough to work for many

It's Alive videos to come? sure.

Can I be better? yeah.

But that's part of the joy of it, right?

Something you can always continuously get better at.

And treat your knives well, it'll treat you well you know.

Sharp knife, you're gonna cut yourself a lot less

than a dull knife where you've gotta push to make

Oh for God's sake we're trying

to make a movie over here.

It's just joshing.

[beeps] Some folks, oh lemme get the sharpener.

Alright, lemme get a different knife for God sakes.

Lemme get the sharpener, this does not sharpen.

Okay, all that this is, is a hardened steel

that's a little harder than your knife.

And what you're doing is when you dull a knife

the edge starts to roll a little, right, okay?

If you look under a microscope,

an edge of a blade is these little diamonds

that come to points and meet together.

And you get a real fine little edge.

This is a blade, underneath a microscope.

This is very important.

And as it gets dull,

those little diamonds start to fold over, okay?

What the honing steel does is throw them back straight.

Same angle, some folks like to just run it on there.

Or you run it down again, whatever makes you happy,

whatever makes you feel comfortable.

But big difference between honing steel and sharpening.

You're not cutting material with this, you're throwing it.

But as much as you need to take care of your knife,

you gotta take care of your stones too.

So besides just dulling knives,

this here unit, it's for flattening, okay.

It's got these channels in it, it's real course,

you run it on your stone nice and evenly, nice and flat.

And this last one takes out,

like you see how we have some of that black in there,

it's from our slurry, it's microparticles of steel,

of stone and this here is gonna help us wash it out.

Because if that starts to build up then

you're not running on a true grit.

[dramatic music]

[laughing] The movie.

And you're running on all types of embedded objects.

So you want to bring it right back to the factory grit,

just like that.

Take care of your stones, take care of your knives,

take care of yourself most importantly okay folks?

Hope that was helpful for you guys, thanks for tuning in.

If you have any questions about knife sharpening,

honing, stones, et cetera

or any general questions about life

or things to do in the kitchen,

just drop it in the old comments section below.

I read every single one of them, so be nice.

[beeps] But remember, there's no real wrong way to do it

as long as you're getting the right results.

Could I be better, yes.

But so could you, so lets get there together, folks.

Bon appétit.

That's the nicest outro I've ever said in my life, I think.

I could do better but so can you, I like that.

Oh that one went right over the fence pal,

alright no little funny jokes

so no bouncing off the wall on that one.

Gone, parking lot in Queens.

[car honking]

That's it. Clean this up, I got work to do.

[cheerful music]