Seasonal Spotlight: It’s Time To Break Out The Slow Cooker

It’s the first day of winter. Temperatures are predicted to be unusually cool for the month of December.

It’s the perfect time, at least for me, to dig through the kitchen cabinets and bring out one of my least-used kitchen appliances: the slow cooker.

When I’m stuck inside on long, cold days, part of my routine is setting up a meal in a slow-cooker in the morning. It doesn’t hurt that the slow cooker fills the house with a bouquet of subtle aromas throughout the process.

Slow cookers have a bad reputation with some cooks, not undeserved. Their extended cook times can be tediously long, which can lead to imprecise results and unwelcome mushy textures.

For the past decade, I’ve turned to Hugh Acheson’s The Chef and The Slow Cooker, a cookbook that combines precise technique and smart ingredients for better slow cooker dishes than I’ve encountered anywhere else.

Over at Taste, you can sample a few of the recipes, including this excellent pot roast with charred onion and chickpea salad. I’m fond of the catfish stew, as well.

If you replaced your slow cooker with an Instant Pot or other pressure cooker, Milk Street has an excellent tip for getting the most out of the slow cooker setting. The key is using the “saute” function to raise the heat before putting the lid on and switching to slow cooking mode.

Do you have a favorite slow cooker recipe? Share it in the comments.