This video makes me sad.

Ok so if you look at a knifes edge under a micrascope you will see it is like a saw blade. Over the course of using it those saw blade looking bits start to curl over and bend. Thats what is happening when your knife is dull.

So when you use a steel (the rod chefs use with their knives), you are running that blade along it to realign the saw blade teeth but upwards so that its sharp. But you need to do this at a 45 degrish angle. If you just run the knife edge against it your going to just break the teeth. This will actually fuck up the knife bad enough that you will have to actually sharpen it with a stone much more often. Which in turn will wear down your knife faster.

Learn to properly hone your knife on a steel is one of the most important skills cooks should know. You use this knife every day, learn how to care for it.

/r/KitchenConfidential Thread Parent Link - youtu.be