Sharper-than-Ginsu sharp

Russkoe vooruzhenie from the beloved NYPL Digital Gallery

To a cook, knives are important. Really important. Cooks talk about their knives the way motorheads brag about their cars, pumping up their knives' past achievements, comparing the relative advantages of German vs. Japanese blades and busting each other's chops over sharpening technique. Water stone? Oil stone? How many strokes across the surface? How hard? What angle? Take a honing steel to it afterward?

There's a lot of professional pride wrapped up in a cook's tools. I've known that for years. But there's something I didn't know until today: when it comes to sharp knives, there's sharp, there's really sharp and then there's Scary-Sharp.

If you're deep into woodworking, maybe you've heard this one before (and if you like, you can read the long tale of obsessive woodworkers and their blade-sharpening experimentation here), but in essence, the "scary sharp" sharpening method involves a series of progressively finer-grit sandpaper strips which are applied to a smooth, flat surface (like marble, granite or heavy glass) with the aid of adhesive spray.

If it works for chisels, it's bound to work for kitchen knives. And though it sounds like fair bit of fuss for those of us who don't have a lot of fresh sandpaper laying around, the sandpaper method apparently takes about 10 minutes to do (as long as you happen to have all the materials on hand) and produces an edge that's, oh yes: scary sharp. So sharp the blade is shiny like a mirror and capable of cutting pine shavings that are four ten-thousandths of an inch thick. (I know I'm in constant need of supremely thin pine shavings. How about you?)

As a person who's spent a good amount of time on blade sharpening (and, admittedly, occasionally dropped some cash when I've felt lazy about it), I really like the DIY angle in this method. Scary sharp is an awfully attractive promise.

Truthfully, I'm not sure I want that kind of power. I wonder if I really need my kitchen blades to be all that they can be. I mean, a sharp knife is a thing of beauty. A knife that whips through tomatoes (and then steel cans!) is an enviable possession. But a knife that could fillet my fingers with the effort of a whisper? With great power comes great responsibility.