How old is your cheese grater?

[FurForksSake]

Mine is 18 years old. I won’t replace it until I don’t know when, but it made me think about how old some of my kitchen stuff is. My knives are 25 years old, I had them as an 18th birthday present and I still use them daily.

I remember clearly being horrified at how old some of the things my mother had when I was growing up, and now I am that person!

My sieves are quite new, they seem to develop holes where they shouldn’t have holes. But my colander (oxo) is also well in to double digits.

21 years old

Cheese grater 30 years old, bought it from Spoils the kitchen reject shop. The oldest thing I have is a milk pan that was my nan’s so it must be 70+ years old.

Oh, I remember Spoils, were they just in Leeds or were they a chain?

We got quite a lot of things from there including this weird crossbolt shaped plastic stick for something ridiculous like 2 pence. I think we used it for stirring pasta before it was relegated to stirring paint and is probably still languishing in the cellar.

My cheese grater was second hand when I bought it, and I have had it about 30 years.

My oldest set of saucepans are about 43 years old, but my oldest stew pan is much older than that. It belonged to my late ex FIL (from my first marriage), not sure how long he had it but it is at least 50 years old.

Where are people getting these cheesegraters that are still sharp after 20 years from?? I feel like ours last about 2 years and then go so blunt that you struggle to use them.

Apparently you can sharpen a cheese grater using a ball of foil or the bottom of a mug!

We bought a set of circulon pans about 15 years ago. They come with a lifetime warranty. I’ve had them replaced three times. The interval gets shorter each time. But they make the offer and the my honour it. At some point we will replace them with heavy stainless steel ones.

Im loving all the stories of kitchen gadgets, kitchen history is fascinating to me. Ruth Goodman should have her own show where we just show her our ancient items and tell their stories.

the bread bin sounds amazing 😻

Our oldest one likely came from a supermarket or 'cheap shop' because we had no money when it will have been bought, we do have a slightly better one but it won't have been particularly expensive.

Might try the foil or mug trick though, they're probably not as sharp as new ones, but still grate cheese easily enough.

My 70 year old box grater gets used for slicing courgettes thinly (there's a mandolin blade on the end) and I need to concentrate to avoid slicing myself. I've never sharpened it. It's fine for hard, well matured parmesan, or raw carrots.

Which suggests the quality of steel being used has deteriorated a lot.

Mine is a cylinder type (I hate box graters) and must be 20+ years old. I use it a lot.

OTOH a citrus zester I bought only a few years ago already seems very blunt - must replace it before the things needing orange/lemon zest, Delia’s mincemeat and 🎄puddings, but I won’t be making any more lemon meringue pies any time soon.

Some of my stuff predates my DH and we’ve been married 33 years.

A 35 year old mouligrater
Some old plates that I brought with me from home, that were free with petrol i think??

Cheese grater about 13 years old going strong. Got some sporks that I love around 38 years old.

Over 60 years old. I still use a couple of utensils over 100 years old.

Based on this thread we should all splash out when buying a cheese grater as it's clearly low price per use!

I think mine was a wedding present, so 17 years old.

33 years old

I got my grater in 1988, along with a few wooden spoons and my trusty old veggie/ spud peeler. I also got my excellent set of stainless steel saucepans that year, and there's a corkscrew knocking around from that time.

My sieves are about 20 years old, steak knives are at least 25, colander was bought in 1990, along with my oldest cast iron frying pan. My cutlery was bought in the early 90s.

My big roasting pan came from the closing down sale of a local kitchenware and gadget shop. I've never seen one of equal size or quality for less than $$$$$$$$$ and I got it for buttons in about 1994.

@Butteredtoast55
My mum still has her entire set of wall mounted utensils with wooden handles from her wedding in 1963!

25 years old, won't be getting rid of it any time soon, hopefully!

I think I've got black treacle older than that. A spoonful goes in the Christmas pudding every year.

Ooh, you're brave Kendodd.

Does your tin say 'Dispose on expiry'? I normally take BBE dates with a pinch of salt and will happily use stuff that is out of date if I think it's safe and not going to taste bad, but apparently out of date treacle has been known to explode and I live in fear of the resultant mess that would need cleaning up should that happen.

Having said that, I've just looked and my tin has a BBE date of April 2025 so I must get on with making the ginger cake that I heard about on the BBC Kitchen Cabinet food podcast, which was a suggestion for using up a tin of treacle.

my original was about 13 yrs old DD1 said it hurt her hands when using it as it had no handle on top to hold it. It worked absolutely fine

then she came home from B&M one day with a new one and I HATE it. It has a curve to it and the handle gets in the way.

I think I might be on my second ever tin as I put it in gingerbread as well. It’s bomb proof stuff though!

About 60. It’s slightly rusty steel and was my mums. Best grater by miles.

I have a cheese slicer that is 33 years old. It was a going off to uni gift from a friend.
My cheese grater is at least 27 years old. I also have a much newer one that is a grater that collects cheese in a tub below, it’s not nearly as good as my old grater.

Mine came as a package with DH. We’ve been together 14 years so it is definitely older than that! 😂