Yesterday we had our kitchen knives sharpened by a wonderful woman named Louise. She has a mobile knife sharpening business where she pulls up to your home with a trailer that contains her tiny, perfectly arranged workshop; and for an extremely reasonable price she expertly sharpens your kitchen knives, pruners, axes, reel lawn mowers, and pretty much anything else with a sharp (errr - dull) edge. Our knives are now deliciously sharp, our rusted pruning shears are in great shape, and the lawnmower has been adjusted. She even gave us two BandAids, in case of accidents with our newly sharp knives.
But Louise only serves a small local area. What if you don't have easy access to knife sharpening in your area? Well, you can always get your knives sharpened by mail - and it doesn't even cost that much.
Knife sharpening was historically a home-to-home business. An expert knife sharpener would travel a circuit between towns and stop at homes once or twice a year to sharpen the household blades. These days it's a little harder to find someone to come to your home. We usually resort to taking ours into a cookware shop, or even to a local JoAnn Fabrics on their free knife sharpening day.
The only problem is that knife sharpening is best done by a trained craftsman. Often these free knife sharpening opportunities, and even the ones in cookware shops, are done with machines. Hand sharpening is more rare. We prefer to have our blades hand sharpened by someone like Louise who is a craftsman and who pays careful attention to the unique character of each knife and tool. (She gave us a small lecture on the character of each of our blades, and tips for knowing when they need to be sharpened.)
One other option for this kind of craftsmanship is The Knife Guy's mail-in knife sharpening service. For $45 he will send you a special pre-paid postage box. You ship him up to 5 of your kitchen knives, and he'll sharpen and send them back. $45 covers the 3-way shipping and the sharpening. Repeat customers keep the box and only need to pay $35 for subsequent sharpening sessions. This price (about $5-7 per knife) is comparable to what you'd pay at other knife sharpeners.
He also promises fast turnaround times: 3-5 days total. The convenience of course is another benefit; not many places sharpen while you wait, so you often have to drop your knives off somewhere, then pick them up a couple days later. This cuts out those extra errands and brings your sharpened knives straight to your door.
We highly recommend keeping your knives sharp; dull knives are more likely to cut you, since you have to apply more pressure to chop. The knife slips more easily than a sharp, precise blade. We were so delighted to have all our blades ultra-sharp again! It makes cooking more fun. Be sure to check out the Knife Guy's reasons why even cheap, dull knives are worth sharpening.
• The Knife Guy's Mail-In Sharpening Service
And if you're in central Ohio, check out Louise Radanovich's business. Highly recommended!
• Sharpening On Site
Related: Knife Skills: Keeping Your Knife Sharp
(Images: The Knife Guy)
My parents just got their knives sharpened at a shoe repair store. $5 a piece isn't too bad
view nickel525's profile
Here's a blog post I did on a mobile knife sharpener I came across a few weeks ago:
http://thepleasanthouse.wordpress.com/2008/10/15/living-history-if-you-hear-a-bell-it-may-be-the-neighborhood-knife-sharpener/
If you are in Chicago, Northwest Cutlery has a sharpening service.
I'm not sure if the little shop in North Beach in SF is still there but it was just like a stationary version of the little man that sharpened my knife with his mobile cart.
view art's profile
I may not be as good as a pro, but I like to sharpen my own knives. Or ask mi padre to do it for me. He's much better at it than I am.
view Tiamat_the_Red's profile
when i was a kid my father's friend would sharpen knives for us and my dad's ax.
view witchbaby's profile
Or you can just learn how to sharpen your own knife and save the cash and time. I don't know about most people but I can't live without my knifes for 1 - 2 weeks. I'll admit my early attempt at sharpening wasn't pretty but I started to get the hang of it after a while. It takes me maybe 10 minutes now to get my 10" chef's knife sharp enough to shave with (which is kinda pointless because how often do you shave with your chef's knife?). Korin has a how to DVD which is nice enough http://www.korin.com/product.php?pid=193&df=knife
view jongchen's profile
I like in an old Italian neighborhood in brooklyn, and every few months a guy drives his truck around ringing a bell, advertising knife sharpenign out of his truck (kind of a gourmet's ice cream truck?). I've never taken him up on it, because i've never seen anyone ELSE take him up on it, and seeing some old dude in a truck offering to sharpen knives seems kind of random to me. He could be great, or he could be awful, and my knives would be ruined. At least if i take them to a cookware shop and they get mauled i could theoretically raise hell and get my knives replaced, but by a travelling salesman....
view mh330's profile
The lady in Chelsea Market on Saturday's is great. I don't remember what I paid, but it wasn't much and the turnaround was only an hour or so (enough time to run a few errands then pick them up on the way home).
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