20 Crock Pot Thanksgiving Recipes - Lydi Out Loud (2024)

FAQs

Can I just throw a bunch of ingredients in the crockpot? ›

For many dishes, particularly soups and stews, you really can just throw all the ingredients in. It can be nice to cook the onions beforehand, as the flavour is different to when you put them in raw, but experiment both ways as you may find you prefer one.

For a family of three to five or a leftover-obsessed couple, a 5 to 6-quart slow cooker is the perfect size. It will fit almost all recipes, including typical roasts. If you've got a big family and plenty of storage room, go for the big 7 or 8-quart models.

Large. If you love delicious pot roasts, then a large slow cooker will be your new best friend! These slow cooker sizes feed up to eight people and have enough room to hold roasts up to 6 lbs and whole chickens with cut-up vegetables.

Yes, you can use your slow cooker for longer than eight hours, as long as you keep an eye on it. Many slow cookers do have an automatic shutoff after 24 hours.

The only difference between the HIGH and LOW setting on a slow cooker is the amount of time it takes to reach the simmer point, or temperature at which the contents of the appliance are being cooked at. The LOW setting takes longer than the HIGH setting.

If you're planning to cook your meals mostly when you're not home or overnight, then sticking to a Crockpot might be a better choice, since the heat distribution is more even and there is no need to stir at all.

Foods take different times to cook depending upon the setting used. Certainly, foods will cook faster on high than on low. However, for all-day cooking or for less-tender cuts, you may want to use the low setting.

It can be tempting to fill a slow cooker to the top, especially if you're preparing a big-batch recipe or cooking for a crowd. But this will technically overfill the slow cooker. "When a slow cooker is too full, it may not heat the food evenly," explains Leal.

You'll get the best results by filling your slow cooker between one-half and two-thirds full. It's fine to cook whole chickens or large cuts of meat in your Crockpot slow cooker, as long as it is roomy enough to allow food to fit comfortably inside, with the lid fitting snugly on top.

How much does it cost to run a slow cooker? If you were wondering what the cheapest appliance to run is, you might be interested to know that the humble slow cooker takes the crown as the cheapest of them all - costing around 4p per hour to run.

Is it okay to leave the crockpot on warm overnight? ›

Don't leave it on 'warm' all day

The general rule of thumb is that 2-4 hours is the maximum length of time you can leave food in a slow cooker on warm. After this, it needs to be cooled and transferred into the refrigerator.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), slow cookers' max temperatures generally reach between 170 and 280 degrees F (77 and 138 degrees C). That's high enough to kill most bad bacteria, but the USDA still recommends thawing all foods completely before placing them in a slow cooker.

"Ideally, you should only fill a slow cooker about three quarters full so there's room [for ingredients and liquid] to expand."

“Keeping the slow-cooker on the high setting for that long may result in overcooked, dried-out food.” Now that you've gotten the basics of how to use your slow cooker, you'll want to level up your chef skills and maximize your flavor from each dish.

The exact impact on cooking times varies from dish to dish, but generally cooking multiple dishes at once can lead to longer cooking times. No matter how many dishes you plan to cook, be sure to leave at least 3 inches of space between each dish and the walls of the oven, or other dishes, to allow for proper airflow.