In my slow cooker today.... part 2

squeaky

raphanius wrote: »

adding ingredients is no good for me because i have to get everything ready before work then OH eats before he goes out and i eat later IYSWIM i'm not there to add stuff before OH eats


plus i need to cover the meat i think so it cooks properly?

Nope

With meat you only need a small amount of water to provide the steam that makes a seal around the lid. You will almost always then get some extra liquid from the meat.

You can add cornflour from the start if you wish, or use a handful of breadcrumbs, or red lentils, or even pearl barley, or even left over mashed tater to thicken the gravy.

Otherwise - teach OH how to reduce gravy


This thread should help:- slow cooker help! need to thicken

And you can browse these others... thicken threads here on Old Style MoneySaving

raphanius

Sunnyday wrote: »

Pour out the liquid into a pan and thicken it in there then add it back to the sc before serving if you`re struggling with lumps, i usually mix up a bit of cornflour in a mug and add that to the sc but the pan should solve your problems. The sc needs hardly any liquid to cook stew as lots of juice comes out of the meat and veg - its a healthy way to get all the nutrients.

SD

i tried to explain i cant add ANYTHING later on because i'm not there. i am at work.

PLUS my slow cooker instruction book tells me to add water to COVER THE MEAT.

i hate waste too but i cant eat fatty greasy gravy so it is unusable to me

plus if i have to poor off gravy to thicken it it defeats the object of having a one pot cooking method like a slow cooker. i am too busy at weekends for mountains of pots.

can someone give me an idea of the right amount of liquid i should have?

Sunnyday

I think that Squeaky has the best suggestion re adding everything including thickeners at the start, either that or cook everything the day before you need it and the portion it up and refrigerate it. You can just nuke the individual portions in the microwave as you need it. That is assuming that you have a microwave of course.

I do think that covering the meat with liquid is where you are going wrong as Squeaky said previously you hardly need ANY liquid at all as it doesn`t evaporate from the sc as in normal cooking methods.

Which sc do you have?

SD

Diflower

Sunnyday wrote: »

There was a thread on this a while ago - everyone who tried it said that it was vile :rotfl:

I usually pour ham stock into a container and freeze it, it gets used at a later date for soup stock.

I`ve never saved the coke because of the other postings on the black bean soup:D

SD

Thanks for that, I didn't see that thread. I can't say I fancied it but now I shan't feel guilty about ditching the coke juice:D

raphanius

Sunnyday wrote: »

Which sc do you have?

SD

its a breville 3.5 litre

plus i wanted a slow cooker to get away from batch cooking and freezing to have something different and save time. OH wont microwave a chiili for example, he'll have sandwiches for every meal if i'm not here but he will eat out of a slow cooker.

applepad

Got some lamb steaks in mine, 50 per cent of al Aldi, a few sprigs of rosemary, 1/2 a red onion, a carrot and 2 x veg stock cubes, plus 1 yellow pepper.

Hope it will be ok, just what we had in.

Alson doing mash and veg, smells good, made some bread in bread maker too

d1gger

Did meatballs yesterday. Having them again today, so that sort of counts. I tried not bowning them. Just put 1 chopped onion, tin of chopped toms, tbsp tom puree, picnh mixed herbs and 15 meatballs that had been lurking in the freezer. It was very nice, but I was surprised how much the meatballs shrank compared to making in the 'traditional' way in a pan.

ellawood

:rice pud :j

lizzyb1812

raphanius wrote: »

its a breville 3.5 litre

plus i wanted a slow cooker to get away from batch cooking and freezing to have something different and save time. OH wont microwave a chiili for example, he'll have sandwiches for every meal if i'm not here but he will eat out of a slow cooker.

Regardless of what the book says you do NOT need to cover the meat. I have a Breville too and it works just fine with just a bit of stock - made a chicken casserole yesterday. Put chopped onions and peppers and mushrooms in the pot. Gently pushed down the veg then added stock to the level of the veg. Added chicken thighs (these were whoopsied boneless and skinless, but any would do) on top plus bayleaf and thyme. Put on Auto and cooked for ages. The chicken gradually sank into the veg - not a chance it was undercooked.

Because I was there I added sweetcorn about 30 mins before serving and dumplings about an hour before serving, but it would be fine without. My dumplings soaked up a lot of stock, but you could add cornflour at the beginning - just whisk it well into the stock before pouring over the veg.

You're not going to get much if any evaporation in a slow cooker, not like on the hob or an oven. So the water from the veg, especially stuff like mushrooms, adds to the moisture. There's enough fat in the meat so no need to add oil.

Disasters - cool the gravy, the fat will separate and can be removed and then thickened in the usual way and the stew reheated on a day when you are around to do it.

Slow cookers are great, but they are a bit different in the way they cook. Ignore the book and check on here - there are a wealth of experts who will help. Try requesting bullet-proof recipes for non-kitchen-friendly-OHs.

tigerstriper_2

I dug my sc out yesterday and cooked a gammon joint. That's for tonight (didn't get to have it yesterday) and I made a soup out of the left over stock overnight. It smells lovely. :j