True confession time: I do not like crock pot cooking.
I know, I know! As a working mom, I should love the ability to “set it and forget it” and come home to a ready meal. Well, here’s the thing – it’s a bunch of lies. The crock pot might be great for someone who is home, but there really aren’t many recipes for the cook who is out of the house at work all day.
So True/So False about Crock Pot cooking:
- You can “set it and forget it”.
So False! Most recipes have you browning meat in the preparation step, changing the cooking temp during the cooking, and include other steps before the meal is done.
- You can be cooking your dish while you are at work.
So False! I leave the house around 7:30 AM and return around 6 PM. That’s 10.5 hours, and I would need to have the meal on by 7 AM, so we are really talking 11 hours. There are very few recipes that call for more than 8 hours of cooking – even on low temp. If you cook your meat for this long, it is either dried out to the point of being inedible or it’s a soup of chunks of meat and bones.
Yes, I know that there are crock pots that can switch to warm after a certain amount of time, but I’m not sure if that is really any better. Do I want to eat something that’s been on warm for the last 4 hours?
- You can come home and have a meal on the table in no time.
So False! I don’t mind the fact that I have to still make sides – it’s a fair trade off for having a main dish that would usually not be on a weeknight menu due to the long cooking time. However, I do mind the recipes that have you – after 6 hours of cooking – strain and drain and add ingredients or thickening, then cook for an additional 30-60 minutes before your dish is actually done. If I’m going to spend another 30-60 minutes working on dinner, I may as well have made one of my 30 minute meals.
I don’t mean to totally bash crock pot cooking – I have figured out how to use it to my best advantage as a working mom. It’s just never going to be the answer to quick weeknight meals that it pretends to be.
My tips for using a crockpot for the cook who works outside of the house:
- I know this will be controversial, but, here goes: buy a timer. You know, one of those for turning on/off a lamp at a certain time (or the Christmas lights)? I use this in conjunction with my crock pot to delay the start of cooking. If I can start it around noon, then I can include many more recipes that have a 6 hour cooking time. The reason this might be controversial is due to leaving the ingredients to sit until the cooker turns on – the temp may be less than optimal. But, since I’m going to practically incinerate the food after it’s been sitting, I’m not concerned that it won’t be safe when it’s done.
- Use it on the weekends. When I finally realized that most of the good crock pot recipes required prep, intervention, and only ~4-5 hours of cooking, a light bulb went off. On the weekend, I usually like to cook meals that I can’t cook during the week because they take longer, but just as often, I don’t feel like cooking at all. The crock pot frees me up to do other activities during the weekend, but still be able to have a nice dinner without too much effort.
- It’s great for entertaining – let’s face it, the crock pot is the number one way we keep other food warm when it’s on the buffet 🙂
I’ll be sharing my (few) crock pot recipes with you – the ones that I have found can take a long time cooking (or I use with the timer), but don’t expect the crock pot to be a staple of my working mom’s repertoire.
What about you? Pro or con for crock pot? Do you have any truly “set it and forget it for 11 hours” recipes?
