Slooooooow Cooker Recipes
Discussion
LordGrover said:
Suet dumplings in at the end.
Tried a recipe a lot like this one:
http://www.marthastewart.com/341261/chicken-and-du...
Now, if we fancy a change, or something a bit lighter, we'll chuck this style dumpling together.
I currently have a free-range, slow-grown chicken in the slow cooker, breast side down, with lemon and tarragon. At the end I'll hoist it out, turn it over and brown it for ten minutes in a very hot oven.
This way I still get the tenderest chicken meat and the slow-growth gives it the best flavour.
I've tried slow-cooking supermarket chicken and it turns to mush. You need the slightly tougher, free-range bird for slow-cooking IMO.
This way I still get the tenderest chicken meat and the slow-growth gives it the best flavour.
I've tried slow-cooking supermarket chicken and it turns to mush. You need the slightly tougher, free-range bird for slow-cooking IMO.
Had a beautiful half leg of lamb in the slow cooker last week, onions, garlic, leek, carrots, tomatoes and rosemary. The meat was heavenly and the veg looked a bit like Spanish 'tumbet'. Used the remaining veg to make a gravy and lovely stock which I've frozen ready for something else.
The kids loved it so much but wanted more, so this week I have 2x half legs. Cooking in the same way as last week, with all ingredients doubled, but its looking a bit congested in the pot and I'm wondering if there will be any detrimental impact to the flavour/texture with it being so full. It is not yet emitting the heavenly smell we had last week, although still a few hours to go. It is looking very wet in there though.
I do hope I haven't ruined it.
The kids loved it so much but wanted more, so this week I have 2x half legs. Cooking in the same way as last week, with all ingredients doubled, but its looking a bit congested in the pot and I'm wondering if there will be any detrimental impact to the flavour/texture with it being so full. It is not yet emitting the heavenly smell we had last week, although still a few hours to go. It is looking very wet in there though.
I do hope I haven't ruined it.
I've started off tomorrow's curry in mine.
This consists of a Kg of cheap gristly lamb, with a punnet of mushrooms and a bag of spinach, plus the following sauce:
Ingredients
3 large onions, finely diced
1 whole bulb garlic, finely chopped
1 large thumb ginger, peeled and finely chopped
3 fresh chillies, finely chopped
1 bay leaf
good pinch black peppercorns
2 cans really thick and chunky chopped tomatoes ('Sargona' Polpa di Pomodoro from Lidl)
2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp Garam Masala
1 'Kallo' chicken stock cube
good glug 'Mellow Yellow' organic rapeseed oil
Method
First fry the peppercorns and bay leaf in the oil in a deep casserole for a minute or so, then add the onions and sweat these off, lid on. Later adding the chillies, garlic, and ginger.
Let all these sweat together until soft, then add the tomatoes, stock cube, and spices. Remove the bay leaf (for now) and blend the sauce with a stick blender.
Put the (raw) mushrooms in the bottom of the slooooow cooker, the raw lamb on top (you can brown it if you really want), and pour the sauce on top, rejoined by the bay leaf.
Allow the flavours to mingle overnight, then set the slooooow cooker in the morning and go to work. Return home to tender, curried sheepy goodness, stirring in the spinach last of all.
Sliced almonds and dried apricots/dates are also a good addition to the dish.
I mostly eat this with rice, but the Berber feasting accompaniment of skinny wheat noodles (pasta vermicelli nests) mixed with ground almonds and a waft of powdered sugar over also work well.
ETA: Call it £9 to cook the above. However it's easily a meal for 6 or 8 with rice.
This consists of a Kg of cheap gristly lamb, with a punnet of mushrooms and a bag of spinach, plus the following sauce:
Ingredients
3 large onions, finely diced
1 whole bulb garlic, finely chopped
1 large thumb ginger, peeled and finely chopped
3 fresh chillies, finely chopped
1 bay leaf
good pinch black peppercorns
2 cans really thick and chunky chopped tomatoes ('Sargona' Polpa di Pomodoro from Lidl)
2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp Garam Masala
1 'Kallo' chicken stock cube
good glug 'Mellow Yellow' organic rapeseed oil
Method
First fry the peppercorns and bay leaf in the oil in a deep casserole for a minute or so, then add the onions and sweat these off, lid on. Later adding the chillies, garlic, and ginger.
Let all these sweat together until soft, then add the tomatoes, stock cube, and spices. Remove the bay leaf (for now) and blend the sauce with a stick blender.
Put the (raw) mushrooms in the bottom of the slooooow cooker, the raw lamb on top (you can brown it if you really want), and pour the sauce on top, rejoined by the bay leaf.
Allow the flavours to mingle overnight, then set the slooooow cooker in the morning and go to work. Return home to tender, curried sheepy goodness, stirring in the spinach last of all.
Sliced almonds and dried apricots/dates are also a good addition to the dish.
I mostly eat this with rice, but the Berber feasting accompaniment of skinny wheat noodles (pasta vermicelli nests) mixed with ground almonds and a waft of powdered sugar over also work well.
ETA: Call it £9 to cook the above. However it's easily a meal for 6 or 8 with rice.
Edited by Mobile Chicane on Sunday 10th March 19:18
Melman Giraffe said:
cheap lamb = good
gristly Lamb = Really? Does the Connective tissue break down during the slow cook?
Absolutely!gristly Lamb = Really? Does the Connective tissue break down during the slow cook?
The gristlier the better. In the slow cooker it will melt into a savoury unctuousness which gives body to the finished dish.
One of my chief gripes about what's mostly sold nowadays as stewing beef / lamb is far too lean and dry to give a good result.
However Asda 'Smart Price' delivers.
Just had two days lunches for two people for 2.99 and there's still some left.
Pulled pork, done with a bit of cheapo Pork leg, plus home baked bread = top sandwich!
Thanks to everyone trying pulled pork on this thread I felt encouraged to give it a try. Yum. Did mine with Jack Daniels BBQ sauce and some apple juice.
Fab.
Pulled pork, done with a bit of cheapo Pork leg, plus home baked bread = top sandwich!
Thanks to everyone trying pulled pork on this thread I felt encouraged to give it a try. Yum. Did mine with Jack Daniels BBQ sauce and some apple juice.
Fab.
escargot said:
Gristle doesn't melt when cooked at all 
It turns to unctuous gloup.I cook untrimmed shin of beef for 4 hours in a 120 degree oven & there's a huge amount of gristle... honestly it looks like roadkill before it's cooked. Tastes stunning afterwards. It falls apart (gristle included) when you gently push a spoon into the chunks of meat.
escargot said:
Gristle is cartilage mate. It's the connective tissue that melts down.
A question of semantics.To me, cartilage is cartilage (although this does soften and helps with jellied stocks), 'gristle' is the tendon which fixes muscle to bone.
In the sloooow cooker at the moment, I have another poverty spec chilli using up leftovers:
2 leftover leeks
2 random onions
Chicken stock from last week
The 'heart' of a bunch of celery
Leftover jar of Doritos mild salsa
To which have been added:
1Kg shin beef
2 bulbs garlic
4 cayenne chillies
3 misshaped Lidl peppers
2 cans chopped tomatoes
a slug of red wine
Plus spices to taste depending on how the above turns out. Could be a sweetish chilli, in need of coriander. Or a drier one, in need of cumin.
There is no recipe - apart from Jailhouse Chilli
- generally I make it up as I go along.Couldn't keep reading this thread without doing something about it, so bought a 3.5l Breville and got stuck in.
Cheap as chips 'value' rolled pork shoulder, rubbed with some spices from the first pulled pork link (mixed with a spoon of golden syrup as it was bloody fiery) then cooked in a kids' carton of apple juice (all I could find!) and half a cup of water, resting on carrot and quartered onion. Had it on low for 11hrs in the end, which was probably a bit too long (we weren't quite ready to eat) but didn't spoil it.
Mixed it with some home made secret family recipe bbq sauce, shredded the onions it had cooked in into it and blasted it for the last 10mins or so until it started to crisp the finer strands poking up.
Oh. My. God.
Had a bit of trouble with the pic but if you click on it it appears in Thumbsnap.
Cheap as chips 'value' rolled pork shoulder, rubbed with some spices from the first pulled pork link (mixed with a spoon of golden syrup as it was bloody fiery) then cooked in a kids' carton of apple juice (all I could find!) and half a cup of water, resting on carrot and quartered onion. Had it on low for 11hrs in the end, which was probably a bit too long (we weren't quite ready to eat) but didn't spoil it.
Mixed it with some home made secret family recipe bbq sauce, shredded the onions it had cooked in into it and blasted it for the last 10mins or so until it started to crisp the finer strands poking up.
Oh. My. God.
Had a bit of trouble with the pic but if you click on it it appears in Thumbsnap.
I re-read this thread thinking I was sure MC had posted an ox-cheek recipe sometime ago.
I obviously missed it...but have bought an ox-cheek and this will be my first time of cooking it...well tomorrowas I'm hoping ox-cheek recipes will just materialise in the next few hours
btw I have leeks, onions, carrots in abundance
I obviously missed it...but have bought an ox-cheek and this will be my first time of cooking it...well tomorrowas I'm hoping ox-cheek recipes will just materialise in the next few hours
btw I have leeks, onions, carrots in abundance
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