Yeah, that’s what attracts me the most – to put dinner together sometime in the morning, and then have it ready when I’m ready to eat – with a fair amount of flexibility about when that “when” might be.
Because the spouse works extremely irregular hours cock pot type dishes, chili, stews and the like are quite convenient.
The two crock pots I have get very hot on the outside. They are poorly insulated. Waste a lot of heat and energy.
Would someone recommend a well insulated crock pot or slow cooker?
janeslogin, since there’s already a pretty active thread on crockpots, I merged your question into it,
I’ve only had Rivals, but I had the same problem with the two newest ones. The second to newest has no noticeable difference between High, Low or Warm- it doesn’t matter, it WILL be boiling after four or five hours. The newest one (the liner broke, but it was no great loss) was slightly better but my old trusty Rival from about 10 years ago is the one I use now, unless it’s soup/alot of liquid and a short time, then I’ll use the newer one.
[One of my less than satisfactory slow cookers is a Revel.]
On another forum an All-Clad was suggested with the disclaimer that it was expensive. $199 to $299.
Can someone recommend a less expensive slow cooker that does not waste heat and energy?****
This thread is making me hungry. I want to buy one now. Any recommendations re model and size?
Anyone have a slow cook recipe involving thin sliced potato, green peppers, onion and sausage?
My Mom would make it in the oven, with everything layered. Sometimes it just wouldn’t come out right, with some ingredients not fully cooked. I’m thinking it would be perfect for a slow cooker.
We have this one. Very adaptable, and works like a charm. In fact, in the next few days it’s going to cook us a pork loin, a batch of Defcon 1 chili, and maybe some stew.
I attempted to start a thread on *buying *a slow cooker and got moved over to this thread which is, mostly, on *using *a slow cooker.
Is the Hamilton Beach 33133H well insulated or does it get hot on the outside?
It does get a bit hot on the outside, so you have to be careful when doing things near it. But the sheer usefulness and adaptability of the three crocks is more than worth the “problems.”
This was an upgrade from the old Rival I had used since college. That one worked, but never got hot enough to do beans well. This new one does beans like a champ.
Okay, I’m taking everyone’s word for it that you don’t really need to get hung up on recipes, and went and bought stew ingredients today. I’m going to brown the meat, throw it into the crockpot with some broth and onions, and let it cook.
When do the other veg – carrots, potatoes – go in? With a pot roast, they don’t go in till the last hour, in order to cook them without having them go mushy. Is an hour enough with a crockpot, or do you do a proportional thing? (e.g., in pot roast, veg are in for 1/4 of total time, so with crockpot they’d get 1/4 of the total time, of 2-2.5 hours.)
Crock-Pot Italian Pot Roast
c2004 H. E. Butt Grocery Company. All rights reserved.
1 (4 to 4 1/2 pound) chuck or rump roast
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 (28-ounce) can crushed tomatoes with basil
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
1 tablespoon fresh oregano
1 tablespoon fresh marjoram
1 teaspoon salt
1 pound pearl onions, or 1 (16-ounce) jar pearl onions, drained
1 (6-ounce) jar salad olives, drained
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup chili sauce
12 small new potatoes, scrubbed
Brown the roast on all sides in the olive oil in a large skillet. Place in a slow cooker. Add the tomatoes with basil, garlic, thyme, oregano, marjoram, salt, onions, olives, Worcestershire sauce and chili sauce. Cook on High for 1 hour. Add the potatoes. Cook on Medium for 5 hours or until the roast is tender and cooked through. Serves 6 to 8.
Suggested menu:
Crock-Pot Italian Pot Roast
Mixed field greens with parmesan walnut Caesar dressing
Crusty Italian bread for dipping into the pan sauce
Amaretto cookies or chocolate biscotti with Spumoni ice cream
My observations (by emo):
- This is terrific.
- Do not even attempt this recipe as written unless you have a super-jumbo crock-pot. I used half the meat specified because I had a standard crock-pot, and the ingredients still barely fit.
- Unless your family looks like Fred Flintstone, the meat/veg ratio is way off, to my taste at least. As I said, I used half the meat, and the vegs could have been bumped up another 25-50%.
- A lot of pan juice is produced, and it is delicious. You could serve it in soup bowls and give everybody half a loaf of bread apiece for dipping.
- I was worried that the olive flavor would be too strong, because I used Manzanilla olives stuffed with pimientos, because that’s what I had. The long slow cooking gave the olives themselves a very mild, mellow flavor. The sauce and other ingredients got a very subtle infusion of olive flavor.
- I modified the technique somewhat. After browning and removing the meat, I hit the pan with a splash of red wine*, scraped a bit, added the tomatoes, herbs and seasonings, and let it heat up. Meanwhile, I put the meat, onions and olives into the crock-pot and cranked it up. After a couple of minutes of simmer time, I added the tomatoes to the pot and proceeded.
- I used Yukon Gold-type potatoes, because that’s what I had, and they worked fine. Same with the herbs: dried, but half the amount specified, because that’s what I had.
- To repeat, this is terrific.
*As advised by AB and Shirley Corriher: some of the flavors in tomatoes can only be released by alcohol.
I did a variation of Alton Brown’s Red Beans & Rice recipe the other day in my crockpot, and it came out fantastic. I held off on adding the meat (just a Hillshire Farms sausage in this case) until I got home, though.
I have this one, and it’s wonderful. Doesn’t get overly hot on the low setting, has a lid you can clamp down for transport, temperature probe, and comes with a serving spoon that fits into the lid handle. Wonderful slow cooker.
Two crock rules. You do not have to buy great cuts of meat. They always come out like they were the high price cuts. It makes meat very tender.The other is the contents will expand quite a bit. If you overfill it will leak and slide down the side. Then you will never get it clean.
I disagree. High price cuts of meat don’t turn out all that well! It’s the cheap stuff that crockpots were made for - it really breaks down the connective tissue, which is usually in large quantities.
So, to restate my question in hopes that restating it might get an answer:
Do veggies get mushy if they cook for the entire 8-10 hours? If they do, and you add them later, when is “later”?
I made barbecue brisket in my crockpot last week. This was the entire process, leaving nothing out:
1.) Dump brisket in crockpot.
2.) Dump barbecue sauce (some generic bottled stuff) in crockpot.
3.) Set crockpot to “low” for ten hours.
4.) Goto bed.
5.) Brisket!
It was good, too. Seriously - there is no easier way to cook meat than with a crockpot.
Carrots and onions are fine after eight hours, potatoes… not so much. They only need a couple hours, especially if you’ve sliced them or cut them up into small pieces.
High price cuts of meat are wasted in the crockpot. Save them for quick cooking methods. Get the cheapest cuts of meat you can for the crockpot, add a splash of wine, and you will think that you are eating the very finest cuts that the butcher has to offer. You don’t need much wine at all, either, just a couple of ounces will be enough. Also, season with a very light hand until you’ve cooked a few things in the crock. The long slow cooking tends to extract all the flavor.