You can cook a nice pork loin roast or perhaps duck breast, or BBQ beef for sandwiches and the crock pot will do the job. This handy tool can become one of the most important appliances in your kitchen.
Once you start using a slow cooker you will find that there is almost nothing you can't cook in it and the results are always predictable and good.
Your time is important and the crockpot will make serving hardy and healthy meals to your family easy. No more running around every evening cooking. Your meal has been made for you with only a few minutes preparation in the morning.
Most of the recipes using a crockpot are very simple but there is something you need to consider when cooking meats. You should try to use the leanest meats available as the fats will render out and pool in the bottom of the pot.
I prefer skinless chicken, pork loin, trimmed of any excess fat and beef as lean as possible. My choice of hamburger is the very lean types at 7% fat.
"Wild" meats and fowl such as duck or goose if skinned are usually very lean meats and cook well in a crock-pot.
I realize that everyone's budget may not allow for this type of selection. To help reduce the fat content of hamburger pre-cooking and draining will help reduce the excess fat. This is not absolutely necessary but it will help reduce those problematic animal fats many of us are trying to stay away from.
Another trick to lower the fat in the meal is to use several small potatoes in the very bottom of the pot. If these are not pealed they will not absorb fat. They can be lifted from the bottom of the pot and allowed to drain before serving.
Crockpots come in several sizes and slightly different units, some have removal pots within the cooker, other more simple models are built in one unit. You can find pots that will feed a large family and small ones designed for one or two people. The choice is your's to make dependent on needs.
We're providing some of our favorite recipes for you to enjoy, these have been used for many years in our household, and they are very easy to change to fit your families' preferences.
There are a number of good, complete cookbooks dealing with just recipes for your slow cooker. If you intend to really utilize this appliance you may want to add one or two of these recipe books to your cook book collection. We've provided a selection of crockpot recipe books from Amazon.com that deal specifically with this type of cooking.
