Slow Cooker Recipes

Slow cookers. Faraway daughter found one hiding away on a shelf at her new home in Shanghai and is now curious as to the best ways to utilize this appliance. She has mastered the instant pot, wok, skillet, roasting pan - but now its the slow cooker. She wants to talk about how to make it useful and it took me a couple of days of thinking to get at an answer.

Slow cookers are a great tool for two things: Starting a dish early in the day so you can enjoy it later and slow cooking a tough cut of meat into sublime tenderness. Most slow cookers have high or low settings that allow you to cook for a couple of hours or up to eight hours. It can also keep soups, stews, mulled cider warm for as long as you want. Slow cookers were a staple of the pot luck - when you wanted your baked beans to stay warm on the buffet for a couple of hours.

Instant pots now do what the slow cooker used to do so well - the long, slow braising of a chuck roast or pork shoulder. Where the slow cooker still shines is in its ability to be utilized earlier in the day in order to have a particular meal later in the day. 

Okay, so lets say, as my faraway daughter said, you actually prefer cooking with an electronic device rather than the stove or the oven. What kinds of recipes can she add to her building repertoire of home cooked meals that utilize a slow cooker? I've seen a lot of recipes touted as a slow cooker recipe that are a little suspicious to me. Read a recipe through, see how much hands-on time it asks for. I mean, why would I make chicken wings in a slow cooker?

Moving on...

Over the years I found that both beef and pork do well in the slow cooker. Dark meat chicken works okay but remember when I mentioned that tough cuts of meat work best? That's not chicken. It cooks fast. A chicken breast cooked all day is still going to be a bit tough and dry at the serving. Ground chicken works, chicken cut up for a stew - or shredded - that's great. Now if you want to make stock then go ahead and add in all those bits and pieces - just remember to strain out all the odd bones. 

Back to beef and pork. While steak is fairly expensive these days, other cuts of beef are often quite a bit more affordable - they just tend to need extra steps to make them tender morsels. I think this is true for pork as well. We see tenderloins and chops, but a large pork shoulder or butt cut - both from the shoulder, by the way with the butt being better for pulled pork recipes - is also going to be less expensive per pound. And don't be put off by the size that you might find - get one that will fit in your pot but know that it will shrink almost 50% by the time it is done.

With beef, I used to buy what they call 'stew meat' - again, rather tough little nuggets if not cooked slow but less expensive then buy a steak and cutting it up. The key to beef and pork is getting some fat in the meat that helps keeps the meats moist. 

Recipes that use either beef or pork? 

Grandmas Pot Roast. Beef Stew. BBQ pulled pork, Asian style pulled pork, Chili Verde (Pork), Beef Birria (Mexican spicy slow cooked beef). Corned beef and cabbage for St. Patrick's Day. Instagram will have hundreds of recipes but try a few first from sources that you like and get the hang of using a slow cooker.

Now let's say you just want to start something earlier in the day because your afternoons are crazy busy. Things like Chicken Chili - or any chili - or a spaghetti sauce will work well. You still have to do the same prep of ingredients so think about your timing. Use a little less liquid as slow cooking doesn't often have the evaporation that cooking on the stove does. 

A few things to think about: 

• Dried beans cook up in a flash in the instant pot but sometimes a good bean soup simmering in a slow cooker works better because you've done your prep ahead of time.
• Stocks and broths - a slow cooker is a great way to make either - again, only if you have time early to start it and want to work with it later. Or cook overnight. 
• If you decide to experiment - remember that cooking certain vegetables will get pretty mushy after 4-5 hours. That is great with onions and garlic, but carrots or potatoes may only need an hour in the pot to add their flavor and soften up. 
• Soup or stew too runny? Sometimes that lack of evaporation really messes up the quantity of liquid. You can do a couple things: remove the meat (like pork) and put cooking broth on stove to reduce. Secondly, add in a roux (either cornstarch and water or flour/butter/broth mixture) to thicken existing sauce or soup. 

My new Instant Pot actually has a slow cooking option - haven't tried that yet but its the same concept. Do I want to prep now or later?

With any of the above recipes there will be some steps to ensure the right flavors. Yes, there are recipes out there that have you just toss a bunch of stuff into the pot, hit the timer and walk away but they usually include cans of added ingredients that I don't use due to added sodium or other things. Most of the meats - whether a pork butt or the chicken for chicken chili will be given a quick browning before adding other ingredients. Beef stew meat really needs this to help build a good hearty beef flavor.  

As you can see, slow cookers are really about the time you have at certain points of the day for a targeted end product. Whether you do this because you really want pulled pork or whether you have time earlier in the day to prep a chili that you want warm for dinner - that's when you decide what appliance you want to use.

A few recipes:

Asian style pulled pork - Omnivore's Cookbook Maggie Shu uses instant pot but this will work in slow cooker really well. Just don't add as much liquid until you see results

Beef Birria - yummy as stew or less liquid for tacos

Grandma's Pot Roast - usually an oven roast but easily made in slow cooker. Brown the meat ahead of time.

Woks of Life Pot Roast -  I think this could be morphed into a slow cooker option. Brown meat and then simmer in slow cooker instead of on the stove. Adjust liquid and depending on cut of meat, give it a good five hours.

Carnitas Tacos - Woks of Life again - but solid recipe. Slow cooker would probably stretch the time to 7-8 hours.

 Chicken Chili - a family favorite. With a slow cooker, I might try ground chicken.