Onion dicer

A sliceable commodity dicer including a stationary grid of crossed blade members, manually operable force means shiftable along a predetermined path between first and second limit positions toward and away from one side of said grid and operative to engage a commodity item and gradually move said commodity item toward said one side of and through said grid from said one side thereof. knife means supported for repeated movement in a plane generally paralleling and slightly spaced outwardly of the other side of said grid and across the latter, and drive means operatively connected to said knife means for repeated movement of the latter across said grid at a speed proportional to the speed of movement of said force means toward said grid, said force means including force plate means generally paralleling said grid and spaced to said one side thereof, the side of said force plate means opposing said grid including a plurality of blunted pins projecting outwardly therefrom and projectable into the spaces defined between adjacent crossed portions of the blade members of said grid upon final movement of said force plate means toward said one side of said grid, extraction plate means having a plurality of openings formed therethrough, said extraction plate means being mounted on said pins between said grid and said force plate means and slidable on said pins between the opposite ends of the latter with said extraction plate means frictionally engaged with said pins to frictionally resist shifting of said extraction plate means along said pins, said extraction plate means being engageable with said grid to shift said extraction plate means along said pins from a position flush with the free ends of said pins toward the base ends thereof when said force means is moved to said first limit position, said extraction plate means including extraction pins projecting outwardly therefrom on the side thereof remote from said grid and projecting through openings provided therefor in said force plate means spaced between adjacent ends of said blunted pins, said dicer including abutment means engageable by the outer ends of said extraction pins during final movement of said force plate means toward said second limit position retracted away from said one side of said grid, whereby to cause said extraction plate means to slide along said blunted pins back to a position generally flush with the outer ends of said blunted pins and thereby strip any portions of said commodity clinging to and wedged between the outer ends of said blunted pins from the latter.