Microplane

I bought my first Microplane for the kitchen when I got tired of barking my knuckles on the old punch-through grater. Not only does it slice off the most delicate wisps of cheese, it also takes considerably less--for example--Parmigiano to make a recipe.

When I got tired of my old rasps, I tried one of their shop tools. Man, did that thing cut. Then I got a couple more. There's one about the diameter of a pencil that is great for shaping. Then I tried the drill press mounted cylinders. Wow. You just have to be really careful you don't take off too much material, because each of the tools is like a graph of miniature cutters, and they don't grind off wood (or cheese) but slice it, like a plane would.

These are first-rate tools, though for the kitchen models, I would stick with the ones with the metal handles. The first one we had, with the clear plastic frame, didn't last long.

I got my kitchen Microplanes from Amazon. The shop Microplanes came from Woodcraft.