For various food processing operations, a wide variety of detachable operating elements are utilized. A number of circular discs are used for slicing, grating and similar operations and are commonly connected to the driving motor by a universal drive stem. Alternatively, cutting and chopping blades or mixing paddles can also be driven from the same drive motor. Selecting the desired operating element from the large number stored, for example, in a simple box or drawer can be tedious, and more importantly can result in severe finger cuts on the sharp edges if great care is not used.