Knife horror stories (was Re: [Sca-cooks] Sabatier knives

[Gorgeous Muiredach]

>And practice is what it'll take. And remember, the standard "magic
>number" is a 15-degree angle between blade and stone.

Ah, yes thank you Adamantius, I forgot to mention the angle...

>when a local knight, whose father had been a kosher
>butcher, I STR, was found with my chef's knife in one hand, and my
>steel in the other, holding blade at 90 degrees to the steel in both
>possible planes, dragging the burr edge of the knife, _hard_,
>directly, straight, across the steel.

And he survived????

I've always prided myself in having my own knives, even when knives were
provided in restaurants/hotels I worked at.  Always prided myself on
keeping my blades sharp.  Some idiot didn't realize the significance of
that and assume that because I left my knives laying on my workstation he
could just pick them up and use them.  Repeatedly I asked him not to do it,
and repeatedly he said "it's just a knive"...

Then one morning, just before service, I caught him using my Henckels
fourstar10" chef directly on stainles steel.  Not a slicing motion, a "chop
chop" motion.  The manager came running in the kitchen after he heard me
scream to the top of my lung something along the lines of "leave my knives
alone you f*cking moron".  (this is the guy who did mayonaise using
French's mustard, in the robot-coupe, and came to me wondering why his
mayonaise was glo-in-the--dark yello.....)

The same guy ended up having to replace that very knife a few months
later.  After he used it to crack open a 2liter canister of olive oil.  He
argued about it.  But the manager basically told him to purchase a new
knife or loose his job.  The good thing is he didn't touch my knives after
that.

Yeah, I know, the easy solution would have been not to use my own
knives...  But...

Gorgeous Muiredach the Odd
Clan of Odds
Shire of Forth Castle
Meridies
mka
Nicolas Steenhout
"You must deal with me as I think of myself" J. Hockenberry