5
19 Turn the control to 2, and leave the slow cooker to preheat for 20 minutes.
20 Meantime, brown the meat and sauté the vegetables in a pan.
21 Boil the cooking liquid in a pan. If you use a tinned cooking sauce, add it to the pan
before bringing it to the boil.
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FILL THE COOKPOT
22 When the 20 minutes is up, remove the lid (oven gloves) and put it on a heatproof
surface.
23 Put the meat and vegetables into the cookpot and add the boiling cooking liquid.
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CHOOSE THE MODE
24 Turn the control to 1 for traditional slow cooking, or 2, if you’re using it as an electric
stewpot.
25 The light will come on, and cooking will start.
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FINISHED?
26 When the cooking time is over:
a) if you want to serve the food right away, turn the control to 0, unplug the slow
cooker (switch the socket off first, if it’s switchable)
b) if you’re not ready to serve, turn the control to
O
, to keep the food warm
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SERVING
27 Check that the slow cooker is off – turn the control to 0.
28 Using oven gloves, remove the lid, and put it on a heatproof surface.
29 It’s best to ladle the food from the slow cooker into serving dishes or plates.
30 Don’t carry the slow cooker, the trailing cable may catch on something.
31 You may use oven gloves to lift the cookpot, complete with the lid, but it’s hot and
it’s heavy – so take care.
32 You’ll find that cleaning the cookpot is much easier if you remove all the food as
soon as it’s cooked, then fill the cookpot with warm water.
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GRAVY/SAUCE
Slow cooking retains more of the juices than normal cooking. This tends to increase the
volume of cooking liquid, and thin the sauce or gravy. To allow for this, sauces should
initially be thicker than normal. Anything to be sautéed could be tossed in seasoned
flour beforehand, to thicken the gravy/sauce.
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CARE AND MAINTENANCE
1 Switch off (0), and unplug the slow cooker (switch the socket off first, if it’s
switchable).
2 Using oven gloves, remove the lid and the cookpot and put them on a heatproof
surface.
3 If you don’t intend to wash up right away, fill the cookpot with warm water,
otherwise residual heat may bake food debris on to the cookpot, making its
eventual removal more difficult.
4 Don’t soak the exterior of the cookpot in water. The base is porous, so it may soak
up water, which may then expand, and crack the cookpot when it’s heated.
5 Wash the lid and cookpot in hot soapy water, using a cloth or sponge, then rinse and
dry thoroughly. Don’t use scouring pads.
6 All other surfaces, internal and external, should be wiped with a damp cloth. You
