Slow Cookers: A Buyer’s Guide
With slow cooking becoming so popular, there are new slow cooker models coming on to the market all the time. So many in fact that it can be hard to choose which one is right for you! To help you make the right decision, we’ve put the following guide together.
Size
- How many people will you be cooking for?
Slow cookers vary in size, from around 2 litres which will hold 2-3 servings, up to about 6 litres in capacity which will hold roughly 6-8 servings. Cooking small portions in a large unit can cause the meal to dry out so if you’ll be cooking for small groups for most of the time, it’s worth considering a smaller cooker.
Will you have your slow cooker on display all the time? If not, make sure you take into account how much space it will take up in your cupboards.
Most small cookers are circular. However, some of the larger models are an oval shape making them ideal for cooking large joints of meat.
Crock Pot
The “crock pot” is another term for the ceramic dish inside the slow cooker.
We would urge you to choose a model with a removable crock pot. It makes cleaning up so much easier! As well as that, some recipes will ask you to remove the entire crock pot from your slow cooker and move to traditional oven (e.g. crisping-up a lovely lamb hot-pot)
They also allow you to serve up your delicious meal at the table, or let your guests help themselves.
If you want to be able to place your crock pot in a dishwasher, be sure to check that you choose a model marked as dishwasher safe.
Cleaning, serving up at table, moving into oven
Timer
Some models will have built in timer functions. These are very handy if you want to start your cooking process while you are out of the house. Great for timing a recipe to be ready when you get back home from work! Although it’s handy to have this function built in, it’s no absolutely necessary because a wall-socket/plug timer will do the same job in most cases.
Functions
Most slow cookers will the following settings.
The slowest setting, ideal for cooking over very long periods of time.
Increases the temperature when you just don’t have enough time to leave your recipe bubbling away all day!
We find this to be the most useful setting and would recommend you select a model that has this as an option. It uses the high setting initially, to get your dish up to temperature quickly but then automatically switches down to the low setting. It can give you the same results as the low setting, in a shorter amount of time.
Some slow cookers will also have a medium setting, although this is rarely called for in recipes.