Slow cookers are not the sexiest of kitchen appliances, but when used well they can offer quietly stupendous results. In my kitchen this Rival Smart-Pot has earned back its low price over and over again in braised lamb stews, tender ragús, and intensely flavored curries.
The Smart-Pot lets you set a cooktime for up to twenty hours using two temperature settings: high and low, which are all you need for slow cooking. But it also has a a convenient feature that will switch the temp to warm after your set cooktime is up. So if you're a little late getting home from work, it's OK; your beef bourguignon will still be warm.
Which brings us to the point of having a slow cooker: for busy city cooks, it's an indispensable tool for winter cooking - look past its dumpy reputation and see it as the perfect instrument for long, slow braises. Instead of hanging around at home with your oven on 250ºF for four hours, waiting for the meat to get tender and absorb all that flavor, put it in the slow cooker and leave for the day.
The stone crock is removeable and easily washable; somehow all the caked-on sauces rinse right off. At five quarts this is also big enough for a roast but not too large to squeeze into your apartment somewhere. That is perhaps the biggest drawback to a slow cooker: finding a place to put it. For me, it's worth it. (It lives on top of the fridge.)
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i LOVE my slow-cooker for all types of meat/stew dishes. lately i've come to enjoy just throwing in some boneless chicken, crushed tomatoes, garlic, onion, carrots, potatoes, etc...for a really easy and yummy meal.
would you please give us a sample recipe, faith? perhaps the curry? i am interested in learning about using a clow-cooker, but i am hesitant because i am a vegetarian and always associated the slow-cooker with meat stews.
Beth Hensberger's Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook has a lot of vegetarian recipes, mfm
Does this slow-cooker get hot to the touch? I live in a studio apartment with a counter-jumping cat (yes, I've tried training her), and I've been hesitant to get one out of concern that she'll get burned.
mfm - good idea! I'm cooking for some vegetarians next week; I'll try a vegetarian curry and let you know how it works.
melanie, the pot itself stays cool on the outside - just a little warm underneath. Depending on what you're cooking, though, it can give off some steam around the edges of the lid.
Great suggestion - Faith! Time for me to drag my crockpot back down from the high shelf over the microwave.
I bought one after reading Mark Bittman's praise of the crock pot with recipes in the NY Times. If you're a member of the Times, here's the archive link:
http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F60F13FA3B5D0C7A8EDDA80894DB404482
I love my slow cooker. Great for weekday dinner solutions. Everything from pasta sauce, homemade bbq sauce, to pot roast and stews goes in my slow cooker.
I've had some success with a few recipes out of the Gourmet Slow Cooker cookbook - although many of them require a good amount of prep before letting the slow cooker do it's job (i.e. sauteeing/browning ingredients before putting in the cooker). I haven't tried any of the dessert recipes - cookies? Other than that, I've got a soft spot for all those comfort dishes mom used to make...beef stew w/ Lipton onion soup mix!
mfm - slow cookers are great for vegetarian cooking. Along with curries, there are tons of option for making bean-based dishes...white bean chili comes to mind.
I'm so glad to see a post here about the Slow Cooker. I use mine a lot and it is so great. I have a basic slow cooker cookbook but I'm always looking for more recipes for it. I make a simple veggie stew with crushed tomatoes, sliced zuccini, mushrooms, garlic, onion, and any other veggie lying around and just cook it all day. Great for chili too.
This is probably a dumb question, but can you slow cook with a rice cooker? i have one that plugs in and seems to work the same way as a crockpot...indirect cooking at low heat. Has anyone tried this?
flyinglimegreen--I think it depends on the rice cooker. Some have many different cook settings, others have only one. You'd have to check that the water (and food) got hot enough not to develop nasty food poisoning bacteria.
Haven't tried it myself, as I've only got a basic model. Once the water boils for a certain amount of time, it shuts off.
Wow. I'm totally guilty of thinking of slow cookers as old-fashioned, decidedly non-gourmet throwbacks. Now I'll have to rethink that--I hate when that happens.
matilda, my library has numerous slow cooker cookbooks, which I've sneered at 'til now for the aforementioned reaasons. I'm sure yours does too.
I've been around Crock-pots for years, & just bought a new one (the old one was a hand-me-down from the 70's, still worked great). I use it constantly for dinners: I come home to a delicious-smelling house, with dinner waiting. Wonderful!
Vegitarian recipes can be found here also:
http://crock-pot.com/recipescatland.aspx?catid=11&parentcatid=1
Autumn Squash Casserole:
http://crock-pot.com/recipescatland.aspx?catid=11&parentcatid=1#
Just made up some slow-cooker beef stew this past weekend. Mmm, mmm good! Cook's Illustrated "Cover and Bake" also has good recipes as well as tips for slow cookers (last section in the book).
Does anyone have recommendations for how to spice slow cooker recipes? I find that if I add them at the beginning, the flavor is pretty bland and 'broken down' by the end of the cooking time. Adding more spices right before serving is good, but not great. Hard to find a good balance. Advice?
How green are slow cookers re electricity usage? Am new to them and trying to do my bit.