How to Use a Knife Sharpening Stone

Dull knives can be incredibly difficult to use when attempting to slice meat, fruits or vegetables. Using a dull knife can also be dangerous since you will need to apply more pressure when using the knife. Keeping your kitchen knives sharp and in good condition is rather simple when using a sharpening stone. If you use the sharpening stone improperly, however, you may end up with a blade that is sharp in some places and dull in others. Does this Spark an idea?

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Instructions

- 1
  
  Soak the sharpening stone in lukewarm water for 2 to 3 minutes. Doing this will make sharpening your knife much easier.
- 2
  
  Place the stone on a towel that is laying on a flat surface. When you do this, the rough side of the stone should be facing up.
- 3
  
  Grab the handle of the knife with one hand. Point the knife so that it is parallel to the sharpening knife. Then, place the thumb of your other hand on the backside of the blade. Your remaining fingers of that hand should then go on the the top (or smooth portion) of the blade in order to guide the knife when using the sharpening stone.
- 4
  
  Point the knife at a 20-degree angle toward the sharpening stone.
- 5
  
  Place the knife at one end of the sharpening stone. When you do this, the bottom, or "fat part" of the blade should be touching one end of the sharpening stone.
- 6
  
  Slide the knife along the entire sharpening stone. When you do this, you should slowly pull the handle of the knife toward you. When you get to the end of the sharpening stone, the tip of the blade should be touching the end of the stone so that you have sharpened the entire blade.
- 7
  
  Repeat this process ten times. Then, flip the knife over to the other side of blade. Sharpen that side of the blade ten times by going in the opposite direction on the sharpening stone. In other words, if you went right to left in the previous step, you would go left to right in this step.
- 8
  
  Repeat the previous two steps until you have sharpened both sides of the blade 50 times.
- 9
  
  Turn the sharpening stone over to the smooth side. Sharpen the knife in the same manner so that both sides of the blade have been swiped over the smooth side of the sharpening stone 50 times.

Tips & Warnings

You should sharpen your knives about once a month to keep the blade in working condition.

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