Introduction
M any people don’t like to cook, but for the most part, they sure do like to eat. As two people who like to do both, we think that people’s aversion to cooking comes from the stress of day-to-day living and not having the time or the energy to cook dinner after a long, hard day of work or even play. That’s probably why more and more people are once again discovering the benefits and advantages of slow cookers. Who wouldn’t like to come home to a hot, homemade dinner at the end of a long day? We know we sure do!
Slow cookers were introduced 30 years ago and have undergone various improvements and innovations. So today’s version of the appliance is not your mother’s slow cooker, and the recipes you use don’t have to be your mother’s either. Slow Cookers For Dummies is a collection of our favorite foods along with some updated classics, all made in the slow cooker. But it’s really much more than that. It also represents our collective experience and effort on how to get the best-tasting food from the slow cooker to the dinner table with the least amount of time and effort. We are going to share with you everything we’ve come to know and like about cooking in a slow cooker, as well as tips and suggestions for getting the best results. If you are as inquisitive as we are, you’re in for a real treat because you also find out how slow cookers work and how to correct problems as they happen. Because food safety is a concern for everyone, you also discover how to use your slow cooker properly in order to avoid foodborne illness.
How to Use This Book
Although the beginning is usually a good place to start, books about cooking are different. You should be able to pick one up and start reading wherever you want, so that’s exactly what we set out to do when we wrote this book. Looking for a great recipe for minestrone soup? Well, turn to Chapter 7 — which contains information about making soups and chowders in your slow cooker — and find everything you need to know to make it. Wondering how much liquid to use when making grandma’s pot roast recipe? You find that information in Chapter 9 — the chapter on meats.
Naturally, we’re proud of all the information we compiled for this book and hope that you will take the time to read most of it. If you don’t initially, that’s okay, too, because we know you’ll like the recipes so much that before you know and even realize it, you will have ultimately read almost everything from cover to cover!
Conventions Used in This Book
For the most part, all the information in this book is straightforward and simple to grasp — even for people with a limited cooking background. Where necessary, we point out things at the beginning or end of the recipes that we think you should know. These items include time-saving tips and suggestions, or even information — such as how long you can store something in the freezer safely. Although some of these items may appear obvious, we’d still like for you to read them to avoid misunderstandings.
Here are two issues that require further clarification:
Time: Time is an important issue for all of us. Naturally, you need to know how long the food must cook. We also feel that it is important that you know how much time is needed to prepare the food before the slow cooker takes over. Therefore, you will notice that every recipe gives you separate times for the preparation and cooking. Preparation time is how long we estimate it will take you to slice and dice, and perhaps brown or sauté, the food before it goes into the slow cooker. Cooking time refers to the amount of time needed for the prepared food to cook in the slow cooker. Both of these times are, at best, approximations.
The basic idea behind a slow cooker is to enable you to prepare a recipe from start to finish with no further intervention once the cover is in place and the unit turned on. Because most people work an 8-hour day and need approximately 1 to 2 hours more for commuting, a slow cooker needs to be able to cook and hold food safely for approximately 8 to 10 hours from start to finish, something that all these recipes do.
However, because our job as food authors entails staying in the kitchen and watching food cook as we develop and test recipes, we discovered that in most instances the food was ready much sooner than anticipated. Initially we saw this as a dilemma and were faced with two possible options: state all the cooking times as 8 to 10 hours — as the manufacturers do — regardless of whether the food was done sooner, or provide the cooking times that we determined to be the most accurate for the recipe being prepared.
After much consideration, we decided to go with the second option and provide cooking times without overstating them. We did so, knowing that foods like roasts, stews, chilis, and soups, hold up relatively well if cooked longer in the slow cooker. By providing you with the actual, shorter cooking times, you can get dinner on the table even sooner than you thought. If you happen to be home when the food is done cooking and are not ready to sit down to dinner yet, set the slow cooker to the warm setting until you’re ready to eat. This way, the food stays at the perfect temperature for serving without drying out or overcooking.
Sodium: As you will see, all the recipes in this book contain a complete nutritional analysis, including sodium content. Because some people watch their sodium intake for a variety of reasons, we want this information to be as accurate as possible. To do so, we decided to add into the total sodium calculation a small amount of salt, 1/2 teaspoon to be precise, whenever a recipe says to “salt and pepper” the meat or poultry.
Foolish Assumptions
Just because you’re reading the introduction to a book about slow cookers, we can’t necessarily assume that you already own a slow cooker. Some people use a book like this one as a guide to find out more about the product before purchasing it. If that’s the case, we recommend you take a look at Chapter 2, where you’re certain to find everything you need to know about slow cookers. You may also check the appendix for a list of slow cooker manufacturers.
How This Book Is Organized
The opening chapters go into detailed product information, as well as use and care information. Because food safety is such an important topic nowadays, we provide you with the latest information on safe cooking practices. You will find the recipes in Part III of this book organized in typical cookbook-menu sequence: snacks and beverages first, then soups and chilis, followed by meat and poultry entrées, and then desserts.
One of our favorite things about our slow cookers is that we can make extra-large batches of foods like tomato meat sauce and chicken broth, freeze them in small portions, and then use them to prepare stovetop entrées that we can serve in no time at all. We view this as an extra perk of the slow cooker. As an added bonus, we include these recipes in a separate part of this book — above and beyond the normal recipe section. We’re certain that you will enjoy these recipes as much as we do.
Part I: Revving Up Your Slow Cooker
This is the place to find out all there is to know about how slow cookers work. Millions of consumers use them, so you’re far from alone! We explain the differences between the types out there, as well as advise you on the latest innovations and features.
Part II: Making the Best and Safest Use of Your Slow Cooker
Slow cookers make great food and are safe to use if you know what you’re doing. So let us share with you everything we know to make sure you get the best and safest results possible. Besides use and care and safe cooking practices, we give you the ins and outs of slow cooker cooking as well as how to adapt your favorite recipes to be made in the slow cooker. For illustration purposes, we take five of our all-time favorite dishes and show you how we adapted them for the slow cooker.
Part III: Basic and Delicious Recipes for the Slow Cooker
Quick, delicious, homemade food is what it’s all about, and those are the results (not to mention compliments) you’re bound to get when you make any of the recipes in this section. Part III contains 65 recipes — covering the gamut from snack foods, to savory stews and succulent roasts, to old- fashioned comfort food desserts like Apple Brown Betty and rice pudding.
Part IV: Jump-Starting Dinner with Your Slow Cooker
Imagine a freezer stocked with quarts of thick tomato sauce or rich chicken broth. Or think about what you could create from a juicy, tender roast turkey breast. If you had previously made these dishes in your slow cooker, they would be ready to be transformed into delicious dinner entrées in less than 60 minutes! Well, dream no more and get cooking with 34 quick and easy recipes to choose from!
Part V: The Part of Tens
Years ago it was common practice for people to pick up the phone and call Mom with their cooking questions. You can still call Mom today, but you’ll probably get her answering machine (after all, she’s got her food in the slow cooker and she’s out on the town). Instead, check out our Part of Tens, where we give you invaluable tips, troubleshooting hints, slow cooker-related Web site addresses, and ten menus for any time of the year.
Appendixes
Someday, sometime, something may well go wrong, and you’re going to need to contact the manufacturer with a question or for assistance. Rather than scramble through old drawers looking for the owner’s manual, refer to Appendix A for a complete listing of the manufacturer’s customer service phone numbers and Web sites, if available. See Appendix B for handy metric and other conversion information.
Icons Used in This Book
Icons are symbols or pictures that represent or convey an idea. We use three of them throughout this book where we think an idea or concept should be stressed for your benefit.
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A Few Guidelines Before You Begin
We learn to walk before we run. And so it goes with everything in life. Because you have taken the trouble to pick up this cookbook and read it to this point, we assume that you are interested in cooking and that you have at least some experience in the kitchen. With this in mind, we give you some pointers that should make life easier for you before you even get started. So please take the time to read them.
Always read a recipe from beginning to end at least once before preparing a dish to make sure that you know how long it’s going to take to prepare and cook, what steps and cooking utensils you will need, and what procedures are involved.
Have all the ingredients on hand before you start cooking. In fact, just so you don’t miss anything, you may want to place all the ingredients out on the counter.
All dry ingredient measurements are level. Spoon into the appropriate sized measuring cup and level off with the blunt edge of a knife. There’s no need to pat down because more is not necessarily better than less.
Vegetarian recipes are marked with a tomato bullet instead of the usual triangle. Some vegetable recipes may call for chicken broth. This can be replaced with vegetable stock and the recipe made vegetarian.
All of our recipes were developed and tested in the most popular 4- and 6-quart slow cookers, round and oval versions included. Unless indicated in a specific recipe, you can use either size or shape with equally good results. If we feel that a certain size should be used, we tell you.
This book is about slow cookers, so we opted to prepare most recipes on the low setting unless we felt that the recipe benefited from being prepared on high, as indicated in the recipe.
Most recipes, with the exception of the master recipes in Part IV, are for 4, 6, or 8 servings. Some recipes can be doubled, and we note that whenever appropriate. Because a slow cooker must be filled at least halfway and no more than two-thirds full, we do not recommend arbitrarily doubling or halving a recipe.
Unless you’re on a sodium-free or restricted diet, judiciously salt your food to taste as it cooks rather than at the end. We like to use kosher salt because it doesn’t contain additives and therefore has a “cleaner” taste. Pepper should always be in the form of freshly ground black peppercorns for maximum flavor.
We don’t know what’s worse: eating overseasoned or underseasoned food. Always taste a dish before serving and adjust for salt and pepper, to taste. If you happened to have a heavy hand with the salt, take a potato or two, peel and cut into 1/2-inch slices, and add it to the cooking liquid. The potato, as it cooks, will absorb a good deal of the saltiness. But what should you do if you feel like you’ve added an adequate amount of salt to hot simmering soup or tomato sauce and it still tastes bland? Hold off on adding any more until you remove a spoonful or two to a small dish or bowl. Let it cool slightly and then taste it. The odds are that the food was so hot that you were unable to get a real taste of the salt. If it still tastes bland, add more as needed.
Fresh milk tends to curdle during the long cooking time of most slow cooker recipes. Unless indicated, the recipes call for canned evaporated milk or sweetened condensed milk. Both are available in whole, lowfat, and fat-free varieties and work equally well.
Oven temperatures are in Fahrenheit.
Keep vegetable oil cooking spray on hand and spray the inside of the cooking container before you place the ingredients inside for cooking. Doing so prevents sticking. In most cases, we remind you to do this in the first step of the recipe.
All eggs are large.