Cookware

Always enthralled by knife sharpening, Friel included in his list the invention of a truly effective electric knife sharpener that would work on a wide variety of knives, particularly, fine quality gourmet knives. He rescued a 20-year-old set of Gerber knives from a closet. They were a present from his wife June, and to his great frustration, he had never been able to put a satisfactory edge on them.

With fierce determination and a personal deadline of three years to show himself adequate progress on the project, Friel set to work in a basement laboratory and then sought the assistance of other professionals. "They were the nucleus of the EdgeCraft team," recalls Friel. He created thirteen prototypes before he came up with one that satisfied him. Soon after its introduction, the Chef'sChoice Diamond Hone Sharpener earned the acclaim of food experts and chefs worldwide, including Pierre Franey, Jacques Pépin and the late Craig Claiborne.

Friel compares the day he left DuPont to follow his second career to the day he walked away from Johns Hopkins University after earning a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering."Unlike the day I left Johns Hopkins, when I left DuPont I could proceed with the knowledge and confidence gained from some 40 years of hands-on experience," Friel recalls. "I saw a need and I had the confidence that I could deliver." More on Chef's Choice...