Slow Cooker recipes

vibe666

campbellu wrote: »

I would add the meat to the slow cooking process as it is the long slow cooking of the meat that gives the intense flavour. The veg by themselves are great however. try using natural stocks however not cubes with additives.

we don't always have the same type of meat in it so it's no good putting it in early on. anyway, i much prefer to dry fry my mince in a frying pan on a very high heat to get nice chunky caramelised meat.

also, the last time we did it, we did away with the freezer bags and put it into hot jars and they are away in a press now for when we need them. dolmio eat your heart out!

et101

I'm living all these ideas please keep them coming thanks

Peckham

Bought a slow cooker at the weekend, and currently have a beef and stout stew being cooked for tonight.

My plan for the slow cooker is to use it mainly for a dinner I can prepare in the evening, whack it in to cook the following morning before going to work and then return home to a nice dinner 12 hours later.

However, having bought a cookbook most of the recipes seem to take 6 to 8 hours on a low heat which isn't ideal as I'm out of the house for 12 hours. I had thought I could overcome this by using a timer plug on the slow cooker, but the books seem to suggest that it's important to only add hot stock, whereas mine would be cold at the start of the cooking process (on a timer plug) if I added it hot a few hours earlier before heading to work.

This gives me three options:
1) Start the cooking process with cold stock (i.e. it will be cold by the time the timer plug kicks in)

2) Lengthen the cooking process to 12 hours regardless of the recipe (if it's on low, this should be fine)

3) Avoid recipes that take less than 12 hours

Any thoughts?

the beer revolu

I's say cooking any slow cooked recipe for 12 hours would be fine.

vibe666

i've cooked plenty of meals for 12 hours or more. i even did one for over 24 hours on the 'warm' setting once and it was fine.

Peckham

Thanks folks.

What exactly is the rationale behind the stock having to be hot when it's added? Surely if it's being added to cold meat/veg in a cold pot, then it's just going to turn cold itself anyway?

vibe666

i imagine it's just to get it up to temp. that bit quicker., but i wouldn't say it's essential.

sometimes what i do is prep it all the night before (chop veg etc.) and leave it in the fridge in the slow cooker pot (minus the meat, or keep the meat prepped separately) until the morning and then just drop it into the cooker part with the meat before i leave for work and it's all done when i get home.

as for the stock, don't put too much in as most of the natural juices from whatever you are cooking will stay in the pot, so you might end up with it too watery.

The Black Oil

Made this last night, turned out well.

1kg of ham, 2 onions, half a dozen cloves, 1 teaspoon of pepper, 1 tsp juniper berries, a few carrots, chopped, 1 can of cider...left it in the crockpot (on low) over night.

et101

Brilliant keep the recipes coming, Thought my slowcooker would change my life and make me a decent cook but it's all been a bit of a letdown!! Will defo try some ideas from here

The Lovely Muffin

pugwall wrote: »

2 cloves of garlic / a thumb-sized piece of fresh root ginger / ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper / 1 teaspoon garam masala / ½ teaspoon sea salt / 2 tablespoons groundnut oil / 1 tablespoon tomato purée / 2 fresh green chillies / 3 tablespoons desiccated coconut / 2 tablespoons ground almonds / a small bunch of fresh coriander
Spices for toasting 2 teaspoons cumin seeds / 1 teaspoon coriander seeds

Whiz all the ingredients in a food processer. Bash the toasting spices in a mortar & pestle before adding them. Add a can of chopped tomatoes and a tin of cocant milk too. Then put the sliced chicken fillet pieces, an onion, 2 peppers, some mushrooms in the slow cooker. Cover with the above sauce and cook on low for 8 hours. Nicest Korma ever. You coud add cream too if you like but I think the above is fine. Actually, we're having it tonight

http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/curry-recipes/easy-homemade-curry-pastes

I bought ingredients to make this and just realised I forgot the peppers, mushrooms and coconut milk.

Could I leave out the peppers and mushrooms or would it destroy the flavour of the dish? Could I use regular/single cream instead of the coconut milk?

vibe666

vibe666 wrote: »

as for the stock, don't put too much in as most of the natural juices from whatever you are cooking will stay in the pot, so you might end up with it too watery.

just as a quick update to this, i did a stew the other week and didn't put any liquid in at all to begin with, just the veg and meat and filled our 6.5L slow cooker pot with it all.

i left it to cook away for ages and when i came back to it, i only needed to add about 1/4 pint of liquid to get it juicy enough to add some suet dumplings to steam off towards the end, so you really don't needed much liquid at all, if any and it is easy enough to add some towards the end if you decide it needs it.

pugwall

The Lovely Muffin wrote: »

I bought ingredients to make this and just realised I forgot the peppers, mushrooms and coconut milk.

Could I leave out the peppers and mushrooms or would it destroy the flavour of the dish? Could I use regular/single cream instead of the coconut milk?

You could I'd leave out the peppers & mushrooms although you should replace them with some other veg. I think it would be better with either or both.

You could omit the coconut milk and replace with tinned tomatoes and add cream at the end.

Good luck and enjoy

The Lovely Muffin

pugwall wrote: »

You could I'd leave out the peppers & mushrooms although you should replace them with some other veg. I think it would be better with either or both.

You could omit the coconut milk and replace with tinned tomatoes and add cream at the end.

Good luck and enjoy

Thanks for your help.

I was in town and got the Coconut Milk and mushrooms but forgot the peppers :rolleyes:

Am going to make it tomorrow hopefully, so will let you know how it goes

vibe666

i decided to give slow cooker chicken a go yesterday and it turned out very well.



i'd read that if you want crispy/brown skin, you should make a sling out of a couple of layers of tinfoil so you can lift it out and put it in the oven for 20 minutes at the end, but we weren't going to be eating the skin so i didn't bother.

I didn't put any seasoning or oil on the meat either (and didn't add any juice at all), i just put in some cut up carrots and a parsnip and a roughly chopped onion and some garlic as a base and chucked the chicken in on top, put it on high until it started to get condensation on the inside of the lid to make sure it was hot enough, then left it on low all day and it was great! will definitely be doing it again.

lovely and tender and juicy and plenty of stock in the bottom that made a lovely gravy.

joeKel73

That's weird - only spotting your post now vibe666 and I cooked something very similar yesterday!

3 roughly chopped carrots, 3 v roughly chopped onions, about 6 bashed cloves of garlic and a roughly chopped pepper as a base. Mixed a bit of oil with some herbs and spices (oregano, thyme, cayenne pepper, cumin, chilli) and rubbed over the chicken and onto the veg. Added a few tablespoons of water so the base was covered and let cook on high for 5 hours. Put two slices of orange on top of the chicken, could just about taste later, lemon might have been nicer though.

It built up a lot of juices, chicken was almost boiling so I tipped them out half way though, as soon as I did I realised I should have saved them for a gravy! Idiot!

The chicken just fell off the bone afterwards, delicious! Served with roast potatoes and the veg.

joeKel73

I got this book, it's excellent. 350 pages with lots of excellent photos. I'll try out some of the recipies and report back.;)

http://www.ebay.ie/itm/Slow-Cooker-Quick-and-Easy-Proven-Recipes-Series-Q-/150798474294?pt=Non_Fiction&hash=item231c4a1c36#ht_974wt_905

The Lovely Muffin

pugwall wrote: »

2 cloves of garlic / a thumb-sized piece of fresh root ginger / ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper / 1 teaspoon garam masala / ½ teaspoon sea salt / 2 tablespoons groundnut oil / 1 tablespoon tomato purée / 2 fresh green chillies / 3 tablespoons desiccated coconut / 2 tablespoons ground almonds / a small bunch of fresh coriander
Spices for toasting 2 teaspoons cumin seeds / 1 teaspoon coriander seeds

Whiz all the ingredients in a food processer. Bash the toasting spices in a mortar & pestle before adding them. Add a can of chopped tomatoes and a tin of cocant milk too. Then put the sliced chicken fillet pieces, an onion, 2 peppers, some mushrooms in the slow cooker. Cover with the above sauce and cook on low for 8 hours. Nicest Korma ever. You coud add cream too if you like but I think the above is fine. Actually, we're having it tonight

http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/curry-recipes/easy-homemade-curry-pastes

The Lovely Muffin wrote: »

Thanks for your help.

I was in town and got the Coconut Milk and mushrooms but forgot the peppers :rolleyes:

Am going to make it tomorrow hopefully, so will let you know how it goes

I made the Korma and while it was nice, there was too much of a tomato taste, which is probably my own fault as I forgot the peppers and coriander.

Will try it again soon and let you know how it goes.

joeKel73

This evening I did a simple (make it up as you go) chicken curry in the slow cooker. Not sure what type - would it be a korma?


(small second helpings, forgot to photo the main dish!)

Serves 4

Spices (v roughly)
3 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons ground coriander
1 tablespoon chilli powder
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Fried 3 chopped onions in oil and a bit of salt, added a splash of water.
Added half the spices to the fried onions and fry for a further 2 mins, then add to slow cooker.

Dice 4 chicken breasts and add to oil, fry on a high heat.
When starting to brown add the second half of the spices.
Add salt and pepper.

Add chicken to the slow cooker.
Add one tin of chopped tomatoes and half tin of coconut milk.
Add 4 cardamom pods and 3 bay leaves.

I didn't think it was looking curry'ish enough so I added about a half cup of McDonnells curry sauce, made from powder.

Leave on the slow cooker on high for 2 hours.
Add chopped bunch of coriander for the last 30mins and taste for seasoning, I had to add some pepper here.

Fish out the cardamom pods and bay leaves and serve!

Seems like a lot of spices but I find spices mellow a lot in the slow cooker, was about medium heat at the end and very tasty!

vibe666

don't know if it would qualify as a korma, they'd usually be very creamy, but it looks damn tasty whatever you decide to call it!

the beer revolu

J o e wrote: »

I didn't think it was looking curry'ish enough so I added about a half cup of McDonnells curry sauce, made from powder.

I was going with it oh so well until this bit.
Now you'll never really know what the combination of spices you chose would have tasted like because they are masked by who knows what number of ingredients in that curry sauce.

My dad does this kind of thing all the time - he'll make a lovely homemade soup, then add a packet of soup "to give it more flavour" - ends up tasting rather like packet soup:rolleyes:!

I'd urge people to have more confidence in their homemade dishes and not add prepared sauces, or packet mixes to them - kinda defeats the purpose of making homemade in the first place if you ask me (which you didn't - apologies if this is unappreciated feedback).

joeKel73

You're dead right - I'll avoid it next time! Going to do a veg version next... cheaper!

The Black Oil

Intrigued by the book above. Might order 2 copies.

Also intrigued by your recipe, Joe. I've never used chicken breasts in a slow cooker before as I figured they would shrivel away to nothing, though that's probably on an over night session. Guess that's why frying them off at the start, and running for 2 hours on high, might help prevent that...

Piliger

Sorry guys I haven't read every post in this long thread ..

I am in Ranelagh and not with car ... where can I buy a nice slow cooker for one/two people ? A small one ?

vibe666

do you have an argos near you? they do some decent small and large ones.

Piliger

Thanks vibe666 ... I'll check their web site. I visited Clery's and Arnotts today and was very disappointed that they only had one brand and two models between them. No timer ? I was surprised. Also they look as if they sit in a bath of water and are steamed ... is that the way they work ?

Kat1170

Piliger wrote: »

Sorry guys I haven't read every post in this long thread ..

I am in Ranelagh and not with car ... where can I buy a nice slow cooker for one/two people ? A small one ?

Tesco have a few choices.

BaZmO*

Piliger wrote: »

Thanks vibe666 ... I'll check their web site. I visited Clery's and Arnotts today and was very disappointed that they only had one brand and two models between them. No timer ? I was surprised. Also they look as if they sit in a bath of water and are steamed ... is that the way they work ?

Are timers a must on a slow cooker? When you're cooking something for 8 to 12 hours I wouldn't have imagined it's an issue.

Dizzyblonde

BaZmO* wrote: »

Are timers a must on a slow cooker? When you're cooking something for 8 to 12 hours I wouldn't have imagined it's an issue.

I don't have a timer on mine and I don't think I'd need one. Even if you're out and back an hour or two late to switch it off, nothing's going to boil dry in there.

Piliger

I've just ordered a small Hinary 1.5 ltr slow cooker from Amazon in the UK for delivery in a week. Quite excited now and will be looking at simple goulash type recipes with anticipation. As a man, I haven't done a huge amount of cooking in the past and now after my divorce I need to buck up Have to figure something out to persuade my son, who lives with me, to eat it. He hates stew (!!).

The Lovely Muffin

I've got this in my slow cooker now, I altered the recipe a little bit.

http://planningwithkids.com/2011/05/02/slow-cooker-spaghetti-bolognese/

I used all the ingredients in the original recipe and added the following to it.

2 teaspoons light soy sauce
2 teaspoon dark soy sauce
Splash of dark soy sauce over the mince while cooking in the pan.
1 Carrot (diced up small)
Few mushrooms (died up small)
Pinch of chilli flakes, rosemary, basil
1 big garlic clove
Cracked black pepper

Hopefully it'll turn out nice, will report back tonight when it's cooked and let you know for sure.