Zwilling J.A. Henckels Twinsharp Knife Sharpener
by J. A. Henckels
(Click here)
Product Summary
Manufacturer: J. A. HenckelsBrand: Twin Sharp
Model: 32591-000
Product features:
- "Resets" a knife's edge; alternative to knife steel
- Employs steel and ceramic wheels to hone knife's edge
- Simple to use--draw knife through slot, toward your body
- Lifetime warranty against manufacturers defects
Kitchen and Housewares Reviews of Zwilling J.A. Henckels Twinsharp Knife Sharpener
Customer Review: Simple and effective
Summary: 5 Stars
I tried this sharpener (for practice) on the ...Farberware knives I hadn't touched since I tried Henckels 4-star and Pro-S knives. These knives had been beaten up from throwing them in the dishwasher, and the Twinsharp put a very serviceable edge on the Farberware slicing knife; while not as effective or well-balanced as the Henckels knives, it *would* once again, smoothly and without fuss, cut through an onion. Be careful about the downward pressure you apply - a little more may be required at first, but a light pressure and smooth motion is required for the final finishing strokes, and you want to tilt the knife to keep the EDGE parallel to the countertop at the point the sharpener touches.I then ran my 6-month old Henckels chef's knife, which was still pretty effective, though the sharpener. The knife cuts much more smoothly, and the sharpener eliminated any "dead spots" in the cutting edge. In addition, this sharpener smoothed out the three nicks that resulted when the knife slipped while I was washing it, bouncing off the drain of my stainless sink... if you look close you can still tell where they were, but the edge is greatly improved; a bit more use and a sharpening or two, and it should be visually impossible to tell the difference.
Just for kicks (and probably disobeying a few common-sense safety rules) I sharpened a dollar-store stainless pizza cutter, holding the sharpener to the floor with my boot and holding the cutter handle with one hand and rotating the blade (to simulate pulling a knife through) with the other. The cutter, which had previously been a pain ...and required a bit of pressure, cut right through a Tombstone pizza on the first pass.
I don't know if it will work for serrated knives, but for smooth-edged knives this sharpener seems very effective and easy to use - just hold the handle solidly against the counter and pull the knife through, keeping the cutting edge in good contact. The sharpener design and knife guides make it easy to hold the knife square in relation to the sharpening elements, resulting in a clean edge. The lefties are correct in their comments; this sharpener IS designed for a right-handed person, and there is no left-handed alternative available, but I found it to work very well for me.
Description of Zwilling J.A. Henckels Twinsharp Knife Sharpener
Despite its name, this tool does not actually sharpen your knives but works exactly like a sharpening steel to maintain the aligned edge on all your pieces of fine cutlery. Hold the black plastic handle in your left hand and draw your knife edge through the V. An essential tool for keeping your knives in tiptop form. Carries the Henckels lifetime warranty.Despite its name, this tool doesn't truly sharpen a knife. It's an alternative to a knife, or "butcher," steel. Like a steel, it performs the vital task of realigning, or "resetting," a knife's edge, which bends this way and that when contacting a cutting surface or other hard object. Because it employs steel and ceramic wheels to do the work on a knife's edge, it can grind a bit of steel off the blade. But that's more a polishing, or honing, than an actual sharpening. It's simple to use: grasp the curved grip with the left hand--left-handers must do it this way, too--and draw a knife through a V-shaped slot toward the body with the right hand. --Fred Brack
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