So I had my very first crock pot failure with George yesterday. It was so bad that George has been shoved to the back of the cupboard as punishment.
I tried to make “Chicken Dinner” – a recipe I found on Recipezaar (a favourite resource of mine when bored at work, for research of course) - and on paper it sounded too good to be true. It was.
It was so bad, it was almost inedible. When cooked, the bird was over 2/3 submerged in liquid and when I tried to remove it, the whole thing imploded. So I ended up with a big bowl of swampy soup-like, chicken scented wrong.
Given I’d only put ¾ cup of liquid in, it was a devastating thing to see –so I promptly went to Google to find out why.... and I stumbled across this site that gives some rather good advice on crockpottery in general. One thing I’ve never got is the liquid thing in a slow cooker –my worst fear is to come home to a burnt, dry mess caked on the bottom of the bowl. It’s never happened. And I will never doubt this theory again after the vision of my drowned chook.
It seems that the steam creates a vacuum – assisting cooking and obviously thus providing more liquid through condensation. On this basis, the roast chicken dinner was clearly never going to be a winner (what WAS I thinking?).
So, instead of sharing the recipe of disaster, or the post-mortem photos, stop by and refresh yourself with this and other handy tips on slow cooking. Go to iVillage’s Cooking How-To Page on Slow Cookers, found here http://food.ivillage.com/cooking/slowcooker/0,,8tgn,00.html
It’s where I should’ve gone before I attempted this sad recipe. It also looks like I’ll be using traditional cooking techniques for a while, while George sits and thinks about what he’s done.... it’s lucky I’ve still got that massive chunk of Chilli Romano cheese, good pasta and a pot!
I tried to make “Chicken Dinner” – a recipe I found on Recipezaar (a favourite resource of mine when bored at work, for research of course) - and on paper it sounded too good to be true. It was.
It was so bad, it was almost inedible. When cooked, the bird was over 2/3 submerged in liquid and when I tried to remove it, the whole thing imploded. So I ended up with a big bowl of swampy soup-like, chicken scented wrong.
Given I’d only put ¾ cup of liquid in, it was a devastating thing to see –so I promptly went to Google to find out why.... and I stumbled across this site that gives some rather good advice on crockpottery in general. One thing I’ve never got is the liquid thing in a slow cooker –my worst fear is to come home to a burnt, dry mess caked on the bottom of the bowl. It’s never happened. And I will never doubt this theory again after the vision of my drowned chook.
It seems that the steam creates a vacuum – assisting cooking and obviously thus providing more liquid through condensation. On this basis, the roast chicken dinner was clearly never going to be a winner (what WAS I thinking?).
So, instead of sharing the recipe of disaster, or the post-mortem photos, stop by and refresh yourself with this and other handy tips on slow cooking. Go to iVillage’s Cooking How-To Page on Slow Cookers, found here http://food.ivillage.com/cooking/slowcooker/0,,8tgn,00.html
It’s where I should’ve gone before I attempted this sad recipe. It also looks like I’ll be using traditional cooking techniques for a while, while George sits and thinks about what he’s done.... it’s lucky I’ve still got that massive chunk of Chilli Romano cheese, good pasta and a pot!
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