10 Cheap And Frugal Crock Pot Dinners That Are Sure To Please (2024)

FAQs

What cooks better in a crock pot? ›

Choose the right cut: Chuck roasts, short ribs, pork shoulders and lamb shanks (think fatty and tougher meats) become meltingly tender with the moist, low heat of a slow cooker. Leaner cuts like pork tenderloin tend to dry out. Likewise, dark meat chicken — thighs, drumsticks, etc.

It usually involves cooking your chosen cut of beef in a slow cooker or casserole dish over a low heat for a long period of time, with the meat submerged in liquid. Tough cuts of meat are ideal for slow cooking as the lengthy cooking process helps to tenderise them.

While a slow cooker offers convenience, it's not the only route to slow cooking. With alternative methods like Dutch ovens, stovetop simmering, oven baking, pressure cooking, and utilising crockery, you can still savour the joys of slow-cooked meals.

Cost-Effective. Slow cookers are a great way to stretch your food budget. You can buy cheaper cuts of meat and let the slow cooker work its magic, resulting in tender and flavourful meals that champion the underrated bits of an animal.

However, Crockpots generally have ceramic or porcelain pots, while most slow cookers have a metal pot. As with a lot of cooking appliances, the biggest difference comes from the distribution of heat.

Slow cooker recipes have (obviously) long cook times, and it's the meat—not the carrots—that benefit from it. By placing the protein at the bottom (closest to the heating element), and vegetables at the top, you can keep your plant parts a little more toothsome, while ensuring your meat is fall-apart tender.

Technically you can cook raw meat in a slow cooker, but it's tricky and requires a bit of preparation in order for it to be really worth it. If you simply pop some raw meat in your slow cooker, it won't have a chance to brown, which adds some much-needed flavor and cuts down on plenty of unappealing grease.

Yes, you most certainly can cook raw meat in the slow cooker! You put it in “cold”, with whatever liquid your recipe calls for, turn it on either “low” or “high” depending on your recipe (I usually start it on “high” for a couple hours, then turn it to “low”), and in 6–7–8 hours, it's now COOKED meat!

One of the cheapest slow cookers to buy and to run is the Swan SF17010N slow cooker, which offers the usual high, low and auto settings to keep your food warm and has a capacity of 1.5 litres, which is large enough to feed one or two people. The ceramic pot is removable and dishwasher-safe.

What is the best meat to slow cook in a Crockpot? ›

Do professional chefs favor crock pots for cooking. Crock pots offer certain advantages that can appeal to professional chefs. They excel at slow cooking, allowing flavors to meld and develop, making them ideal for dishes like stews, soups, and braised meats.

Food texture changes: Canned foods, such as vegetables, can become too mushy in a slow cooker. It's better to use them fresh or frozen. But, frozen veggies tend to make the texture of the dish more “watery”. Defrosting and draining the extra liquid before cooking can help minimize this.

Your meat will be juicier and more tender

The longer cooking time and the low heat complement each other perfectly. As a result, even though the meat is cooked for far longer, it doesn't dry out because the temperature is low. As a result, this is the best way to retain all the natural juices of the meat.

The difference between "High" and "Low" on slow cookers seems to differ with every brand and model. One thing that is consistent, though, is that food takes seven to eight hours to reach a simmer point (around 210°) on low; versus three to four hours on high.

Oven cooking is often faster than slow cooking. As a general rule, a dish that takes 6–8 hours on a slow cooker's low setting might only need 2–3 hours in the oven at 325°F. Always check for doneness earlier than the original recipe suggests, especially if you're converting for the first time.