Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper - Nice but Not a Must Have

Strolling around the Big Blue Nightmare after Thanksgiving dinner I spotted a deal I couldn’t pass up. The Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper was on sale for a mere $4. Sold!

What You Get
The Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper (model HC306) is a small, white food processor. It comes with a single chopping blade to chop, dice or mince food. The clear bowl, with cover, has a 1 ½ cup capacity. The electric base wipes off for cleaning while the bowl, blade and lid are top rack dishwasher safe. There is a 1 year warranty on the unit in the US and Canada.

My Experience
I use my large food processor regularly, but sometimes it was just a little too big for the job I need to do; it wasn’t very good and uniformly chopping small amounts of vegetables. So I hoped that a smaller processor would do the trick.

The Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper is good, but not great, at least for my uses. I want a chopper primarily to chop raw vegetables for me. It handles up to 1 cup at a time, of food you have already cut into chunks. To operate you rotate the bowl and cover into the locked position (a safety feature), plug it in and press the on/pulse button to begin to chop. The one button does not lock down, you must hold it down to keep the chopper from running. The recommendation is not to run the unit for more than about 30 seconds at a time. Once you take your finger off the button the blades continue to whirl for a few seconds.

The most difficult thing to get used was learning to stop the processor before the food was the size I wanted. Since the blades keep turning the food continues to be processed. Those few extra seconds can mean the difference between finely chopped and onion pulp. And if you stop it too soon and want to process again for slightly smaller pieces, sometimes even a quick touch of the pulse button is too much.

Softer items, like onions, garlic and bread process better than harder food like carrots or celery. The harder the food the more difficulty I have getting a uniform chop. I’ll end up with a bite size piece of carrot along with pieces that are equivalent to a fine grate. It does a great job on egg whites and dressings where you are just looking to obliterate liquids.

I was disappointed that The Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper could not handle whole spices or seeds. They get thrown to the outside of the bowl just beyond the blade's reach, no matter how much I put in too process. I guess I will need to buy another coffee grinder since my husband has re-appropriated mine for his coffee.

Clean up is easy. I put everything on the top rack of my dishwasher and it always comes out clean. Because the unit is so small, about 6” X 8” and about 6” tall, it is easy to find space on a shelf to keep the it within easy reach. I do wish there was some storage for the 3' cord, as it gets in the way of other items on my shelf.

I am annoyed by the locking feature of the lid of the bowl. There is a tab on the lid that must slide into the main housing before the processor will operate. While this is a common and good safety feature, the design of the housing means you can rotate the tab into the rear of the housing or into the front of hte housing. However, the process or will only run if you twist the lid into the front of the housing. The housing should be designed to so the lid can only go in one way.

Final Thoughts
The Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper is not a must have. Since you still have to pull out a knife and cutting board to cut raw vegetables into pieces that fit in the bowl, sometimes I just finish the job by hand. That way I know I am getting pieces into the size I want. For larger jobs I still need to pull out my full size food processor. The Black & Decker One-Touch Chopper is for middle of the road jobs, a couple of items, like peppers, onions that you want finely diced for soups or sauces. I have certainly gotten $4 worth of use out of it, but wouldn’t pay much more than that.