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7
• M
any things can affect how quickly a recipe will
cook, including water and fat content, initial
temperature of the food and the size of the food.
C
heck food is properly cooked before serving.
• M
any recipes will take several hours to cook. If
y
ou don’t have time to prepare food in the
morning, prepare it the night before, storing the
f
ood in a covered container in the fridge. Transfer
the food to the Cooking Pot and add boiling
liquid/stock. In most of the recipes in this book,
t
he meat ingredients are browned first to improve
their appearance and flavour.
• If you are short on preparation time and would
prefer to skip the searing stage, simply add your
meat and other ingredients into your Slow Cooker
and cover with boiling liquid/stock. You will need
to increase the recipe cooking time as follows:
High setting +1hr, Low setting +2hrs.
• Most meat and vegetable recipes require 7-9
hours on the Low setting and 4-5 hours on High
setting.
• Some ingredients are not suitable for slow
cooking. Cooked pasta, seafood, milk and cream
should be added towards the end of the cooking
time.
• Pieces of food cut into small pieces will cook
quicker. A degree of ‘trial and error’ will be
required to fully optimise the potential of your
Slow Cooker.
• All food should be covered with a liquid, gravy or
sauce. In a separate pan or jug, prepare your
liquid, gravy or sauce and completely cover the
food in the Cooking Pot (3).
• When cooking joints of meat, ham, poultry etc,
the size and shape of the joint is important. Try to
keep the joint in the lower 2/3 of the pot. If
necessary, cut into two pieces. Joint weight
should be kept within the maximum limit of 2kg.
• For ham and brisket fill with hot water to just
cover the joint. For beef, pork or poultry cover to
1/3 depth.
• If smaller quantities of food are cooked in the
Slow Cooker, than we recommend in our recipes
you will need to adjust the cooking time. For
example, if you use half the recipe quantity the
cooking time would be reduced to approximately
two thirds. A casserole normally which could be
cooked for 10 hours on Low setting would be
ready to eat after 7 hours.
• R
oot vegetables should be cut up into small
pieces to ensure that they cook evenly. To ensure
vegetables are properly cooked in the time
r
equired, cook for a couple of minutes after
browning meat . Always ensure root vegetables
a
re placed in the lower part of the cooking pot
and are always covered with stock or other liquid.
• F
or your own recipes, browning meat first in the
cooking pot will reduce cooking times but also
help seal in meat juices and prevent separation of
f
at. If meat is not sealed first, the end result may
not be as good and between one and two hours
would need to be added to the cooking time.
• Food will start cooking more quickly if stock,
water and wine are hot when added to the
cooking pot.
• We recommend that meat and vegetables for slow
cooking should be at room temperature rather
than used straight from the refrigerator as the
cooking process will start more quickly. The
recipes in this book have been produced with
ingredients at ambient temperature. If using
chilled ingredients cooking times will be longer.
• Our recipes have been tested so that you can
choose to use the High or Low setting to suit your
own domestic arrangements. Dishes cooked on
the High setting take less time to cook than the
same dish cooked on the Low setting.
• At the end of the set cooking time, the Slow
Cooker will automatically switch to a 2 hour Keep
Warm setting. For example, a casserole timed to
cook for 10 hours will keep warm without
detriment to the food for a further two hours.
• When using your own recipes, you can use the
Slow Cooker timer to suit your own
arrangements. For example, food may be
prepared first thing in the morning and be ready
on your return home. You can use the timer to
cook food as desired but still have the flexibility of
the 2 hour keep warm period, should you be later
returning than expected.
• A minimum cook time of 6 hours and a maximum
of 10 hours may be set using the timer on Low
setting. Intervals of 30 minutes may be timed, for
example 8 hours 30 minutes. The minimum and
maximum times may be further extended by
utilising the two hour Keep Warm period.
• A minimum cook time of 4 hours and a maximum
of 7 hours may be set using the timer on High
setting. Intervals of 30 minutes may be timed, for
example 5 hours 30 minutes. The minimum and
maximum times may be further extended by
utilising the two hour Keep Warm period.
Shortening Cooking Times
Extending Cooking Times
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