Slow cookers - should I buy one?

I wouldn't be without mine. I've used one for years, and this must be about the third, always buying a bigger one each time. I now have a large, oval chrome one which easily holds a good-sized chicken, and can be left safely to cook for hours. If I'm using a cheap cut of meat, I put it on low and give it about 5 hours, sometimes more. My DGD and her boyfriend are hoping to find a flat soon, and she's asked for one as a moving-in present.

I got a large oval one with 2 sections, thinking I'd have 2 separate dishes on the go at one time - maybe one pudding and one main. I never actually use it that way, worried about the smell transferring, so wouldn't recommend them.

I would get a large one. I'm actually veggie but I get a very large joint of beef which I cook on high for about 8 hours, it is really tender. When cool I slice and freeze it into portions with some of the gravy, it is so handy after work to heat through.

This is all very interesting, my mam had a slow cooker in the 1970's and used to make lovely casseroles and stews etc. I had a slow cooker a few years ago and wasn't very impressed with it, all the food tasted, well, 'slow-cookered'. I used proper recipes from the book that came with it and even bought a slow cooker recipe book to use as well. When returning from a day out the entire house would smell of dinner! I could make lovely rice pudding in it though. Where did I go wrong?

I gave mine away. You either had to put it on at stupid o'clock in the morning, or give the food only four or fives hours which wasn't really slow cooking because it boiled. I agree with the poster who said the food tastes "slow-cookered". Perhaps pre-frying would get round this, but what's the point? And, yes, the whole house smelt of it.

Much prefer microwaves. Which I couldn't do without. Got three of those.

"the poster" was frida. (read the thread the wrong way up)

yes, yes, buy one. so handy for when you are going out. the smell of a lovely cooked meal when you come in is wonderful. smile

I love mine - it was especially good when i worked, especially when the lads and DH all got home at different times. I always put a stew on when I was going to uni after work.

These days I make my own thick stock in it. I chop up onions, carrots, broccoli stalks, cauliflower stalks, garden herbs (usually sage, parsley, oregano, rosemary and basil),pepper, some fat from a pork chop or bacon, and a chicken stock cube. After about 6 hours on high and 6 on low, I put it through the blender, and either use it for a casserole, or pour it into clean jam jars and freeze it for later.

Back when I was a working mum and studying at uni part time, I just used bought soup, packet or tinned, as a base.

I do wish I could find some good receipts for my cooker, I hardly use it and would love to.

I've tried cooking stews but the gravy is thin & watery not a lovely thick gravy like it is in the oven, which we like, why is this.

I mainly use it for making stock for soups.

Love your recipes if you have some.

I always seal my food in the pan first and find it does give a better flavour. To thicken it I often mix flour into soft butter and stir small lumps of it into the pot about 20 mins before serving.
I have a friend who is a nutritionist and she tells me that microwaves are banned in Russia because of what they do to the food - has anyone else heard that too?

I also have a halogen oven which is good and cheap to run.

That sounds unlikely to me, Bez. Microwaves don't do anything odd to the food, just heat it. They work in a different way to an oven, which applies heat from the outside, but they don't apply radiation and make it radioactive, which I suppose it what she means.

I found this, Bez wiki.answers.com/Q/Why_were_microwaves_banned_in_Russia

No - she says that when they did tests in Scandinavia they found that the microwaves 'killed' the food which other forms of cooking did not. She said the Russians then did more tests and banned them from sale. Seems they I'd not publish the results here because of the harm it would do to sales etc.

How did they kill the food?

Well worth getting, the last one I got was very cheap, the dish which the food is cooked in comes out much better than my first one where it was quite hard to clean.
My daughter and grandson come on Tuesdays for tea and as I am out all afternoon I always use it, any meat, any vegetables, nice gravy and seasoning, delicious!
Cook a piece of gammon on a bed of brown sugar and also sprinkled on top for 5 hours on high, a lovely meal and lots for sandwiches. Yummy

Don't use my slow cooker as often as I should, but wouldn't be without it!

Does my favourite venison casserole perfectly!

Mine is a round one, but if I was starting from scratch I would buy an oval one, as you can then put in a whole chicken, leg of lamb etc.

I'm almost hoping that mine "dies" as then I would have a reason to buy a new one as stated above!

I wasn't at any of the lectures and could not fathom that out but they had some sort of meter that was passed over the food before and after cooking.
What she said made no difference to me as I rarely use one - just preferring other methods of cooking.

Pseudoscientific twaddle. Sorry, but I don't buy it.

All microwaves do is cause water molecules to vibrate thus heating the food. Tthe only possible chemical reactions that could occur with heating water in a microwave are that it would produce hydrogen gas or oxygen gas

Microwaving your food is probably HEALTHIER than frying it or cooking it on the stovetop.

It's that caremelization of fats, the browning of your meat, the charred parts of food that will kill you, which does not occur in the microwave. Carmelization of the meat, or browning is the result of the protein and fat chains shriveling up and mutating.

Here are some references. The first is the one I like best.

skeptoid.com/episodes/4080

boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=652273

in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061108120224AAUwKJw

It may well be but dangerous if being taught to professionals.

It is not being taught to professionals. It is being repeated by amateurs.

Registered Dietitians (RDs) are the only qualified health professionals that assess, diagnose and treat diet and nutrition problems at an individual and wider public health level

But (and I am not knocking your friend here, she is not out to deceive anyone, and I would not like to accuse her of it) anyone at all can set themselves up as a nutritionist and teach their principles to others. They do not necessarily have the experience of scientific rigour in evaluating the claims of past "nutritionists". Some of their "rules" are sensible and some, frankly, nuts.

Ben Goldacre has an excellent (and readable) book called "Bad Science" in which he says a lot about nutritionists. Amazon have it

Nutritionists are rather inclined to go over the top about claims like this which sound as though someone has discovered a serious danger to health which is being covered up. It is like the claims that some substance could rid the world of cancer, if only the whole medical profession had not hidden the knowledge, for fear it would stop them making money out of misery.

If there were any substance in those claims that microwaved food causes many major diseases, made that long ago, then some bright spark of a post-grad student would have picked up on his chance of fame and repeated the exercise, with proper double-blind studies and statistical analysis. As it is there are only vague references back to a study which was not documented or published, as far as I can see.

I think she has been trained as a dietician as she worked for local authority places teaching nutrition and how to cook things etc to deprived sections of the community, but I have to confess I never grilled her on the subject and I now see her very irregularly due to us both moving house.

I bought mine from Tescos £9 it is a 4 person middle size job. I put my stuff in on low before I go to bed, Meat, Veg, Sauce. 10 hrs later finito. Meat so tender and tasty it's hard to believe.

You can pre-fry your goods if you want to get fancy. I don't usually.

PhilBoy xx