Slowcooker
- Thread starter Walkerie
- Start date
Its a cooker. I put raw everything in mine, ive even done pasta and its all good
It can cook chicken and other meat with potatoes & veg in around 2 hours on high
im looking for a slow cooker at the mo, its just for me, ill obv freeze what i dont eat though. I need an auto setting as I plan on sticking it on at about 7:30, and then tucking in for tea most of the time at about 17:00.
Theres a one in argos thats £23 with an auto setting, thats the cheapest I can find to be honest, dont know if its any good.
http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/4231473/Trail/searchtext>SLOW+COOKER.htm
reviews look good though.
Theres a one in argos thats £23 with an auto setting, thats the cheapest I can find to be honest, dont know if its any good.
http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/4231473/Trail/searchtext>SLOW+COOKER.htm
reviews look good though.
Yep, thats the one ive got. Its excellent, auto on in the morning, food done at night. Just make sure to cover water with all food inside it. I only put a bit in the first 2 times and it went extra crispy and was hard to clean
Associate
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- Bishopsworth, Bristol
I'd always 'brown' my meat and certain veg off first, for the flavour more than anything.
You can put dumplings in, I normally put them in the last hour or two of cooking, turning them every now and again as they rise.
I got a slow cooker a while ago and its very good for cooking casseroles and making pie filling etc. I've made steak and ale pie loads of times using the slow cooker and it tastes much better than when i just cooked the filling in a pan.
For thickening stews and broths i usually add some pearl barley, rather than gravy granules. Too much gravy tends to overpower the other flavours IMO. I add some gravy to give it some flavour and a bit of colour though.
For thickening stews and broths i usually add some pearl barley, rather than gravy granules. Too much gravy tends to overpower the other flavours IMO. I add some gravy to give it some flavour and a bit of colour though.
Dunno about everyone else but if I have time, I bring to the boil first and then slow cook for at least 5 hours (stew); meat should fall apart and veg be soft.
To 'thicken' the gravy, mix up some cornflour with cold water and then add it; pearl barley is a good addition too; for extra secret ingredient, try Bovril, Worcester sauce etc.
Negative.
You sort of learn how much to put in there to suit the consistency that you want. As has been mentioned you can put things like corn flour in if you want to thicken it up a bit.
You find that the liquid level actually increases so, if you put enough in so the level is just below the top of your ingredients it should work fine then, flour and cold water mixed to a paste and mixed in at the end, lovely.
Soldato
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- 17 Jan 2006
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Browning the meat off, or just sealing it, is advised because that way the meat stays in form in the cooker, without it meat like beef, lamb etc have a tendency to fall apart during the long cook. If you brown it off first the meat stays in chunks but still gets beautifully tender...makes for a much nicer meal as you can actually identify the meat...lol
My recommendation for a good slow cooker recipe from another thread not that long ago.
http://91.151.218.11/showpost.php?p=15140358&postcount=8
Valve
Soldato
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- 22 Sep 2008
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To thicken, use cornflower mixed with water and stir in, as mentioned above.
I got the Morphy Richards one for about £30 and it is superb.
Make your dinner before you goto work, throw it in the slow cooker, turn it on, go to work, come home from work and dinner is ready.
Have found it didn't work well with bolognese though, unless you like all your mince to disintegrate to nothing! Turned into a paste! I wasn't a fan of that, but for everything else, it was good.
I got the Morphy Richards one for about £30 and it is superb.
Make your dinner before you goto work, throw it in the slow cooker, turn it on, go to work, come home from work and dinner is ready.
Have found it didn't work well with bolognese though, unless you like all your mince to disintegrate to nothing! Turned into a paste! I wasn't a fan of that, but for everything else, it was good.
Plain flour and water, you dont need cornflour.
Plain flour tastes better when thickening and the same bag of flower can be used to make sauces properly as well, what ever you do don't use cornflour, yuk
