The Cleveland Knife Sharpeners Guild is an association of independent
sharpeners who provide professional knife and scissor sharpening
services throughout NE Ohio. All Guild members focus on careful
low-speed sharpening that respects your good knives. Our emphasis is
on quality rather than quantity. We cooperate on promotion and share
referrals. Contact a member that serves your area.
A proper knife sharpening
service should not only be able to provide a new edge but to correct any
issues with blade shape, including broken tips, high bolsters and swale
or "rainbow" that prevent the edge from reaching the cutting board. Do
not hesitate to ask your sharpener if s/he can do these things.
Any system where you only
hold the knife by the handle leaves the bolster high and contributes to
the swale issue. That includes pull through machines that hardware
stores and Sur la table use, and even the common steel. Use a
professional sharpener from time to time and learn to keep the edge
touched up between sharpenings with a ceramic steel or ceramic pull
through, which take off much less metal than a steel. Tungsten carbide
pull through sharpeners do more damage to knives than anything else.