Hi all

I have just bought a slow cooker as a spur of the moment thing and have no idea what to cook in it.  Some of the recipes on the internet are very americanised and look completely unappetising so I am here to pick your brains for any tried and tested recipes that you have found scrummy.

I like pretty much all food so nothing is really off limits!

You'd be amazed what you can cook in them as long as you remember to start the veg off on the stove top first otherwise root veg can be very erm crunchie lol.

Any soup, stew, broth can be done in one, Egg custards or blamonges basically anything that needs a slow low temp cooking time.

>You'd be amazed what you can cook in them as long as you remember to start the veg off on the stove top first otherwise root veg can be very erm crunchie lol.

ive never done that with veg, I do however seal my meat first in a frying pan. 

We cook everything in ours, soups, beef joints, curry, various stews - carribean stew is really nice (beef, butternut squash, chopped toms, garlic, paprika and stock then for last half hour add chick peas and black eyed beans - yum ! )

we have a cheap little book that I picked up that has simple every day recipies in it, some of the slow cooker books are way to technical for me !!

I have an 9 month old baby and quite often cook her stews in it overnight ready to pot up and freeze in the morning (very weird waking up to the smell of stew though )

I'm a recent slow cooker convert - and I still haven't done all you can do with it - it's like the bottom oven of an AGA if you know what can be done with one of them.
Traditional rice pudding.... you can even do porridge in it overnight... Stick a whole chicken in with some liquid and if you cook it long enough the bones disintegrate an soften enough to feed the lot to a dog.... Making stock... making amazing soups out of nothing....Poule au Pot, a whole chicken on a bed of sliced veg, bit of stock, bob's your uncle, meat falls off the bones, and the bones can be use for stock or recooked til soft for dog food the next day!

Americans call them Crock Pots and there are some good recipes online but you have to look; try specifying UK. No idea why but a lot of american recipes seem to want to add canned or dry soup mixes....!

I was given a couple of pheasants just after christmas and I cooked one in the slow cooker, it was lovely and the leftover bones etc made a really lovely soup afterwards.

Marvellous, so there is a whole range of stuff you can cook in it.  I'll get looking for a recipe book as a foundation then I guess anything goes really.  I never even thought about cooking things like rice pudding in it.

How long can you leave things in it for then?  I was thinking maybe throwing stuff in before work so it's ready for the evening, or can you even start it the night before?

I usually prep it the night before then switch it on before I go to work.  Joints of meat I do for 10 hours but stews with chopped meat I tend to only do for 7-8 hours (thats when it becomes tricky if you are out for longer so those ones we do overnight then reheat when we get home)

We dont have one as we have an aga, my mum used to cook casseroles, hotpots  etc in hers, the aga bottom oven is the same type thing.

We have a multi functional one where it is a slow cooker ( beef stew cooked in Old Speckled Hen that has been cooking since 10 am just about to be served :-) ) then it cooks rice (perfectly) then it also does porridge !

A great book is the ultimate slow cooker book with that as a basic the worlds your oyster. I use ours weekly with Chilli's, sausage cassaroles, stewa, curries stuff it all in and it cooks itself. A riec pudding is really creamy and pot roast beef falls off the bone. I have just got a new one and given the kids my old one with a cook book and there off stewing.

I got my cook book in Robert Dyas for about £5 and it had some really good recipes one with meat, onion spices add macaroni at the end really jummy.
I do a pot roast with a cheap cut of beef, put potatoe and roov veg in the bottom, meat on top pour over enough boiling water to just cover the veg, lid on tight about 8 hours perfect, use the juices to make the gravy and cruchy bread.

Have made some spanish potates and got some stuffed peppers in as I type this.  I got a book from amazom for £2 and it seems great.  Once I get more confident I'l try inventing my own recipes....maybe!

Our lot (SIL & Ben& flat mates) have done gammon in coke and all say that turned out really well.

we did gammon in cider which was quite nice :)