Slow Cooker
Posted on January 7, 2008
Filed Under Kitchen Gadgets |
In today’s busy world, it is easy to get takeout or snack on potato chips and soda pop instead of preparing food after work. A good slow cooker can really help out if you want home cooked meals but are on a tight schedule.
There are many cookbooks that show how to make tasty main dishes and complete meals with your slow cooker. After prepping the ingredients and putting them in before you leave for work, this awesome kitchen gadget does the rest. The food is cooked at a relatively low temperature, over a long period of time, and the cooker can run by itself all day with no fear of burning or boil-over. The lower temperature never reaches boiling point and the lid is not sealed tight, so there is no danger of food escaping during the heating process.
The simplest slow cookers have a low heat setting, and a high heat setting. More advanced models have timers, total cook time settings and more. There may be different heat settings for roasts, stews and soups, fish and poultry. Many also have a ‘keep warm’ setting, for when the cooking is done. they come in all sizes, from a four cup mini-crock to a six quart family size cooker. They are priced from $20 to $100 in most department stores.
The larger models have a removable stoneware cooking bowl, which is dishwasher safe and doubles as a container to temporarily store left-overs in the fridge. Some of the smaller models have a permanently mounted cooking container, which isn’t as handy.
Stews and roasts are exceptionally good when made in the slow cooker, as the meat becomes extra tender. Others swear by the Crock Pot baked beans that have been slowly simmering all day. They also double as a chocolate melter for those who make their own chocolates, and even desserts are made with the slow cooker.
One thing to keep in mind is that raw kidney beans need to be boiled for 10 minutes before adding into your slow cooker. This is because toxins in this kind of bean are destroyed at boiling temperatures, but no at the lower temperatures that a slow cooker operates at. Canned kidney beans have already been cooked and are safe.
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