Wow this is one fine thread!

One way to explore this is to try and
sharpen butter and cheese.

Some tools shave off curls some tools
smear the surface or gather a lump.

Steel like butter can be brittle (when cold)
or soft and malleable (warmer)....
Compare and contrast a soft cheese
with a hard cheese like Parmesan and
all the ones in between.

Then explore hardness tests... take
a marble and "measure" how it dents
the cheese with pressure.

The hard Parmesan cheese is interesting because
it shows "micro chipping" and also has salt
crystals.

The obvious thing missing
in my cheesy analogy is work
hardening. Work hardening can be key
to the shave-ability of many steels and has
applicability to final stropping.