Slow cooker- can I turn up the heat
I am cooking French dip, using a chuck roast. And I ended up having to substitute a recipe (I didn't have a can of soup so I improvised). It took a bit longer than I thought and now dinner won't be done til around 9 to 10. Is there any way I can turn the heat up do it cooks faster without it ruining my dinner?
Best Answer
Ok, from the clarification in the comments:
I'd say that roughly speaking, "high" cooks twice as fast as "low". This is a very rough estimate, and also depends on the slow cooker a lot (they vary in temperature...). So, each hour you spend on high is like spending two hours on low. You can use that to figure when to turn your slow cooker up so its ready on time.
Example: You have 7 hours until dinner. Recipe says 9 on low. So you do 2 hours on high and 5 hours on low. The 2 hours on high count for 4 hours of cooking on low, so you have the 9 hours the recipe called for. And 5 and 2 are the 7 actual hours you have until dinner.
Given how approximate the conversion is, you should probably plan to have it ready a bit before time, and then turn it down to "keep warm". Note that cooking will continue on "keep warm", especially as it'll take a while for the food to cool. Keep warm should be around 150°F, which will keep the food safe to eat (its out of the danger zone), but will actually continue cooking, just very slowly.
Also, you should check on when its done by visual clues (as much as possible), and (as quickly as possible) check the texture. You want to keep the lid closed as much as possible, opening it will slow it down a lot. Check no more than once per hour.
If you have a thermometer you can leave in the meat, you could use its internal temperature. My newest slow cooker has a temperature probe, but most don't, so that's probably not an option. Though depending, you may be able to stick a probe thermometer through one of the vent holes in the lid.
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Quick Answer about "Slow cooker- can I turn up the heat"
If timing does not allow the recipe to be cooked on low for as long as required, the slow cooker can be turned up to high and the cooking time reduced.Can I turn up the crockpot from low to high?
Hopefully your recipe has some guidance on how much less time it'll take on high (and of course, if you only turn it up partway through cooking, it'll be something between the low and high time). You can leave it on keep warm for a bit, but probably best not to leave it for more than an hour or two. It does not. Sadly.Is 2 hours on high the same as 4 on low?
The difference between the two settings isn't a higher temperature, it's the time it takes for the slow cooker to reach the simmer point. On high, that's around three to four hours, and on low, it's seven to eight, according to Crock-Pot. So imagine if your dinner is cooking away on high all day while you're at work.What temperature is high heat on a slow cooker?
In general, Low setting on a slow cooker = 190 degrees F and High setting = 300 degrees F. When using a slow cooker, follow these guidelines. Start with fresh or thawed meat\u2013not frozen.Can you heat up in a slow cooker?
Don't reheat in a slow cooker. Do not reheat food or leftovers in a slow cooker; instead reheat on stove top or microwave (165 F or above) and transfer to slow cooker to keep warm (140 F or above).Mistakes Everyone Makes Using The Slow Cooker
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Answer 2
I have a couple slow cookers, just some fairly cheap generic brand, and they both have Low, High, and High-then-Low settings. I've seen similar settings on other slow cookers.
The one manual I can find for my cookers says:
- High is supposed to cook things in 1/2 the time of low
- the High-then-Low setting starts on High for about 2 hours, then switches to low
- the result of the High-then-Low setting is that cooking time is shortened by about 2 hours overall.
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