This will be the last episode of the year. I’m going to take December off from the podcast, and I’ll be back early in January with some new episodes. I hope you have a lovely December, and I look forward to being back next year.
Today, let’s talk about crockpots or slow cookers. A crockpot is one of the most time-saving things, and I’m always surprised at how many people either don’t have a crockpot, or they don’t know how to use theirs; they don’t know what to cook in it. Hopefully, after this episode, you’ll know a lot more, and you’ll feel confident in using a crockpot.
One of the great things about a crockpot is that they’re so cheap to buy. They’re one of the cheapest kitchen appliances there is. Have a look near you and see if you can find one that’s good for you. You also get different size crockpots – depending on the size of your family, you can buy a small one or a big one. You can get bigger ones like eight quarts, and you can get six liter crockpots. Have a look at what the options are, and get one that works for you.
So, let’s start with some of the best reasons to use a crockpot, and why it’s so convenient and helpful. This is kind of “set it and forget it” cooking. You just have to prep things; chop them and mix them up, put them into the crockpot, and then you just have to switch it on and walk away. You don’t have to stir it or check it. You don’t have to do anything for at least three or four hours.
This is really helpful when you have a busy day, and you’ve got a lot going on, or even if you’re going to be out. Just put it on a slow setting, and then you’ve got a good seven to eight hours before you need to check it. With a quick stir, dinner can be ready when you walk through the door.
Number two – it makes your meat extra tender. I found this to be true for everything except beef. Sometimes the beef doesn’t work so well, and I find that it works better in the instant pot. Everything else, though, whether it’s chicken, lamb, or pork, definitely works brilliantly in the crockpot or the slow cooker. The slow low heat breaks down those tough, tough fibers. Pork shoulder becomes amazing pulled pork. You just need to add the rub and the sauce with it. Chicken becomes juicy, not dry.
Number three – the slow cooker saves money. You can use less expensive cuts of meat in it. You can use dried beans instead of canned ones, and cook them in there. You can use bulk veggies. Also, the crockpot uses very little electricity as well – you don’t have to have the stove running or a gas plate on for hours.
Number four – it cooks while you are out, which is a real bonus whether you’re going to the grocery store, to work, or to the gym. It can cook very safely while you’re out. It can even stay on and cook your food overnight if you’re making something like bone broth on a low setting. You can also do breakfast like oats overnight. The flavor gets better the longer it cooks. It’s enhanced as it simmers, but it doesn’t get too hot because the heat is set at a certain level, and so it’s fabulous for stews, curries, soup, and sauces. Then your flavor is fabulous, as if it’s been on the stove for hours.
Because the temperature never gets too high, it’s very hard to burn your food in a crockpot. That’s a real bonus. You can set it on high or low, and then it’ll stay at what it needs to be. The food won’t scorch, except if it runs out of water. That can happen, but generally you’ll be doing a sauce-based meal, so it shouldn’t burn it all. You don’t have to worry about forgetting about it or getting distracted.
The slow cooker is fabulous for meal prepping because it makes it really easy to cook up big batches in advance. You can cook shredded chicken in it, or you can do chili, soup, or stew, and then freeze it in portions for your weekday meals.
It also stops the kitchen from getting too hot. The oven and the stove top can heat the room, but the crockpot hardly does at all. That’s a real bonus when it’s hot in the summer.
The crockpot is great for one pot meals. Sometimes you can do a veg on the side when you’re cooking in it, but usually you’ll put everything in together and cook it at the same time. Your rice, meat, sauce, and veggies can all be cooked there together. This way, you use fewer dishes, so it’s much easier for cooking and cleaning.
It’s great for beginners and people who say they’re not cooks, because the recipes are so simple that they’re almost foolproof. They require minimal skills. Usually you just need to add some ingredients and do some chopping. Kids and teens can safely help because there’s no open flame, so it works great.
With a crockpot, you can cook for a crowd, which is perfect for big family dinners or parties. At our church meals, people would often bring a whole crockpot full of food and plug it in at church so that it stays hot. Also, you can scoop directly from the crockpot itself, so you don’t have to worry about serving dishes or about reheating it. It’s really easy.
A crockpot is very versatile. You can make so many more things than just stews. You can make curries, pasta, rice dishes, ribs, breakfast items like oats, hot chocolate, whole chickens – which work amazingly – desserts, and bone broths. Those are the best types of meals to cook in a slow cooker or crockpot.
It’s excellent with foods that need long, slow heat, like stews and curries. It’s perfect for slowly simmering, making deep flavors. You can make soups in it – just pop everything in and forget about it, and it’ll slowly cook up to a delicious flavor and thickness. You can do pulled meats like pulled pork or shredded chicken. Beans and lentils are great as they cook slowly and absorb flavor beautifully.
You can do tough cuts of meat like beef or brisket. You can definitely cook lamb in the slow cooker – lamb leg, lamb shoulder – it becomes almost meltingly tender. I even love to use it for roast chickens because they become fall-off-the-bone tender. If you want the chicken to have a crispy skin, then you can crisp it up in the oven afterwards, but the crockpot works so great for tender meat. You can make one-pot meals using rice or pasta, and all you need to do is stir it at the end. Mac and cheese in the crockpot is great. There are also breakfast casseroles like egg casseroles and overnight oats.
So, here’s how to use a crockpot step by step. You shouldn’t heat it when it’s empty – it’s not like an oven that you turn on in advance. You start by prepping your ingredients. Do your chopping and put your liquids into the crockpot, whether it’s broth or sauce. Then you need to chop your meat, measure everything out, and then start by putting it into the crockpot.
It doesn’t matter a huge amount what order you put everything in, but it is helpful to do it in a certain order. Potatoes, carrots, and onions, which are a bit harder, need to go at the bottom – they need the most heat. The middle layer is going to be your meat – chicken breasts, lamb on the bone, lamb chops, pork, or whatever you’re going to be cooking. Put the softer vegetables and the beans on top.
Then lastly, add your liquids. You want to be careful and add them down the side so that they don’t wash seasonings off the meat and vegetables. As you add the root vegetables, then your meat, and then your softer vegetables, you should season them. Maybe you can use a mix of spices, herbs, and salt that you’ve made, or maybe you put certain ones on certain layers.
If you’re doing carrots and potatoes, then you can put some salt and maybe some onion powder and some oregano on that layer. Then on your meat – let’s say it’s chicken breasts – you can put salt, onion powder, maybe some smoked paprika, and maybe a bit of chili powder. You can put some salt on your softer vegetables on the top. Then you’re going to get a good amount of seasoning through the food.
Later on, you’re going to mix it all up, but for now it’ll cook as it is. You usually want to have liquid up to at least a third of the height of the food – you don’t need to have a whole lot of liquid unless you’re making something like a soup, but you do want to have some liquid so that the crockpot’s not going to dry out. Usually there’ll be more liquid coming out of the vegetables and meat while it cooks, so you definitely don’t want to have too much liquid, as then you’re basically boiling your food.
If you’re doing something like a leg of lamb or a roast chicken, you just need a little bit of broth at the bottom to make into gravy. You don’t want to have too much liquid; just half an inch or one centimeter at the bottom. If you’re doing something like a pulled pork, then you need to put a rub on the meat, and then add your sauce. It cooks in that sauce. Again, the sauce should be up to about a quarter of the height of the crockpot.
Then you need to choose the right heat setting. Most crockpots have two main settings. There’ll be a low setting which you use to cook things for six to ten hours – about eight on average. This is good for tough cuts of meat and things that need deeper flavor, things like lamb. On high, you should do things for three to four hours. That’s faster, and it makes the food slightly less tender, but it works great for chicken breasts in a sauce and things like that. There’s also a warm setting which holds the temperature after the food is cooked. It doesn’t make it get dry or overcooked, but just keeps it warm.
So, whenever possible choose low as the meals are going to come out more tender, especially things like beef and chicken thighs. This also means there’s a longer gap for you to do other things, so use the low setting when possible. Sometimes I find that if there’s not enough time in the day, like if I’m going to do a leg of lamb, and there aren’t eight hours before dinner, then I’ll cook it for one to two hours on high, and then switch it over to low for the last four or five hours. That generally works great.
One thing I find is that if I turn a big piece of meat over halfway through, it helps with the tenderization. The top of a leg of lamb may dry out a bit if you don’t turn it over – the bottom part will be immersed in the liquid. So, about halfway through cooking, turn over your lamb. Most of the time, though, that isn’t necessary. When you’re doing other things like stews, soups, or even roast chicken, you don’t need to turn it.
Also, don’t open the crockpot more than you need to. It’s okay to do it once to check if it’s tender, but every time you open it, you lose about fifteen to twenty minutes of cooking, as the heat escapes and it has to heat up again. Generally don’t open it, but it’s helpful sometimes to check how it’s doing.
If you’re doing a big piece of meat, like a leg of lamb or chicken, just chop up some onions into quarters and put those or some carrots under the meat to hold it up off the bottom of the crockpot.
Don’t over-fill the crockpot – three quarters is the fullest it should be. If it’s overfilled, it’ll cook unevenly, the food may dry out, and it’s harder to mix. Another reason that you may want to open your crockpot during cooking is to give your stew or soup a quick mix. Also, if you’re cooking something with rice or pasta, you’ll want to give it a quick mix along the way so that the edges are not dry and the middle full of liquid. We want the liquid to be evenly spread out.
If you’re going to be adding dairy or fresh herbs, it’s best to do that at the end of the cooking. Milk, cream, and yogurt can curdle, so it’s best to add them in the last thirty minutes. If you’re going to be doing a bolognese, you can add your pasta in the last half hour as well, and then it should cook well as long as there’s enough liquid. Then it helps the sauce to thicken. It’s the same with fresh herbs – they taste best if added towards the end of the cooking.
Remember to taste and adjust your seasoning before serving. It’s very important to add more salt and maybe a few fresh herbs at the end. Don’t add spices at the end because raw spices are very hard on the stomach, and they also cook the flavor into the meat, so you don’t need to add them at the end. You can add citrus at the end, like a splash of lemon or a bit of lemon zest. That adds a lot of flavor, just like the fresh herbs.
If you want to reduce the liquid a little bit, then for the last half of an hour you can take the lid off the crockpot. That should help some of the liquid evaporate. Sometimes you can take the meat out that’s cooked, thicken your sauce, and then add the meat back. Generally, though, crockpot recipes don’t need that. The recipes are set up so that the liquid works correctly.
Here are some easy and delicious crockpot meal ideas. You can look up recipes for any of these, and I’ll put a few at the bottom of this post. You can do slow cooker chicken curry, beef stew, or a pulled pork shoulder with barbecue sauce. The chicken curry needs six to eight hours on low, and the beef stew and the pulled pork both need eight hours on low.
Chicken noodle soup is delicious. You’ll add the noodles at the end, but initially, you’ll be adding chicken breasts, carrots, celery, broth, and herbs. Cook it for six hours on low, and then add the noodles at the end. You can make bolognese sauce with minced beef, tomato puree, onion, garlic, and herbs. This also needs about six hours on low, and its wonderful, deep, rich flavor develops better than it does on the stove top.
A vegetable lentil soup is very hearty and inexpensive. You can do crockpot chicken and rice. Add the rice one and a half to two hours before the end so that it doesn’t turn mushy. You can do shredded chicken breasts – Mexican chicken, barbecue chicken, and chicken with cheese sauce are all amazing in the crockpot. You can do whole chickens, as I’ve mentioned.
Beef or pork ribs in a marinade are fantastic in the crockpot, and they’re so tender. You can make lamb curry, or chili con carne in the crockpot. You could do Thai chicken curry, creamy Tuscan chicken, barbeque chicken, sausage and beans stew, and of course, overnight oats.
I’ll add some recipes, as I said, at the bottom of this post, but I hope that you’re brave enough now to try using a crockpot. If you don’t want to buy one, maybe you can borrow one and try it out to see if it’ll work for you. It just takes a bit of planning. All you need to do each day is rinse out your crockpot, add the next day’s food, and let it cook while you’re out. It’s so fabulous and easy – I’m going to be using mine a lot this December. I hope you have a blessed Thanksgiving, a merry Christmas, and a wonderful New Year’s Day.
Slow Cooker Chicken Curry
(serves 4–6)
Ingredients
- 1 kg chicken thighs (boneless, skinless)
- 1 large onion, diced
- 3 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 tablespoon grated ginger
- 3 tablespoons curry paste (mild or medium)
- 1 can (400 ml) coconut milk
- 1 can chopped tomatoes
- 2 teaspoons garam masala
- 1 teaspoon turmeric
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup peas (optional, add at end)
Instructions
- Place onions, garlic, and ginger at the bottom.
- Add chicken thighs.
- Stir curry paste into the coconut milk + tomatoes and pour over chicken.
- Add spices.
- Cook 6–8 hours on LOW or 4 hours on HIGH
- Stir in peas in the last 15 minutes.
- Serve with rice or naan.
Classic Beef Stew in the Crocpot
Ingredients
- 900 g beef stew chunks
- 4 potatoes, chopped
- 3 carrots, sliced
- 1 onion, diced
- 3 cups beef broth
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 teaspoon thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 tablespoons flour (optional, for thickening)
Instructions
- Add potatoes, carrots, and onions to the bottom.
- Add beef on top.
- Mix broth, tomato paste, and seasonings → pour over.
- Cook 8–9 hours on LOW or 4–5 hours on HIGH
- For thicker stew: mix flour with a little water and stir in for the last 20 minutes.
Pulled Pork (perfect for sandwiches)
Ingredients
- 1.5–2 kg pork shoulder
- 1 cup BBQ sauce
- ½ cup apple cider vinegar
- ¼ cup brown sugar
- 1 onion, sliced
- 1 tablespoon paprika
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoon black pepper
Instructions
- Place sliced onion at the bottom.
- Rub pork with paprika, salt, and pepper.
- Place pork in crockpot.
- Mix BBQ sauce, vinegar, sugar → pour over.
- Cook 8-10 hours on LOW (best method) or 6 hours on HIGH
- Shred with two forks and return to sauce.
Chicken Noodle Soup
Ingredients
- 3–4 chicken breasts or thighs
- 3 carrots, sliced
- 3 celery stalks, sliced
- 1 onion, chopped
- 6 cups chicken broth
- 1 teaspoon thyme
- 1 teaspoon oregano
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 200 g egg or rice noodles (add at end)
- Fresh parsley (optional)
Instructions
- Add all ingredients except noodles
- Cook 6 hours on LOW or 3 hours on HIGH
- Remove chicken, shred, return to pot.
- Add noodles for the last 25–30 minutes
- Garnish with parsley.
Slow Cooker Bolognese
Ingredients
- 500 g / 1 pound minced beef
- 1 onion, diced
- 2 garlic cloves, chopped
- 2 carrots, finely chopped
- 1 can crushed tomatoes
- 1 small can tomato paste
- 2 teaspoons Italian herbs
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon sugar (optional)
- ½ cup beef broth
- ½ cup cream (optional – add at end)
Instructions
- Add all ingredients except cream into crockpot.
- Stir lightly.
- Cook 6–7 hours on LOW or 3–4 hours on HIGH
- Stir in cream in the last 20 minutes for richness.
- Serve with pasta.
Butter Chicken in the Slow Cooker
Ingredients
- 1 kg / 2 pounds chicken breasts or thighs, cut in chunks
- 1 onion, diced
- 3 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 thumb ginger, grated
- 1 can tomato puree
- 1 cup cream (add at end)
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 2 teaspoons garam masala
- 1 teaspoon turmeric
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 tablespoon brown sugar (optional)
Instructions
- Add onion, garlic, and ginger first.
- Add chicken.
- Add tomato puree + spices + butter.
- Cook 6 hours on LOW or 3 hours on HIGH
- Stir in cream 15 minutes before serving.
- Serve with rice.
Shredded Mexican Chicken in Crocpot (for tacos, burritos, quesadillas)
Ingredients
- 4 chicken breasts
- 1 jar mild or medium salsa (about 2 cups)
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- Juice of 1 lime (add at end)
Instructions
- Place chicken in crockpot.
- Pour salsa and spices over.
- Cook 6 hours on LOW or 3 hours on HIGH
- Shred chicken and squeeze lime over before serving.
