Quick! Get out your slow cooker!

Apparently some 80% of American kitchens own a slow cooker.

At least that's what Candy Sagon cites in her Wash. Times article expressing her newfound love of the slow cooker.

While Sagon is just realizing all the fabulous benefits of these otherwise awkward kitchen appliances, I grew up loving it when Mom would pull her short, squatty, avocado green KitchenAid slow cooker out, usually on the weekends, and cook a good stew or roast.

I always wondered what possessed Mom to buy that crock pot in that avocado green color. I suppose it was a nice accent to our kitchen's bright yellow Formica and burnt orange-and-gold plaid wallpaper. I freaking loved that kitchen.



I also loved Sunday church picnics where all the women would pack in their crock pots. Some were gold; others that late-70s yellow; some had rustic-looking pears and other fruits painted on the outside....even though no one ever cooked a pear in a crock pot.


Crock pots, or slow cookers, are all bright & shiny stainless steel now, but slow cooker meals are still the best because you can throw whatever you want into the mix: veggies, meat; add some spices and a little liquid of really any variety (a friend's mother always used Coca-Cola because it sweetened the meat....they were from the south...), plug it in, and hours later your house smells like a spicy, meaty heaven.



Most old-school community cookbooks are loaded with some pretty great slow cooker recipes that are easy and will make cheap meals. Recipes Worth Sharing is a cookbook that claims to have some of the "best" recipes from decades of community cookbooks. This one's for the Slow-Cooker Pot Roast. The recipe is fool-proof and the roast makes really great leftovers for cold sandwiches.





Slow-Cooker Pot Roast
Ingredients
1 (3-pound) boneless beef chuck roast
2 large garlic cloves, sliced
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/3 cup olive oil
1 1/2 cups red wine
1 onion, sliced
1 (8-ounce) can tomato sauce
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon prepared horseradish
1 teaspoon prepared mustard (use creole mustard if you want an extra kick)
1 bay leaf
8 small red potatoes
8 carrots, peeled and quartered (or just throw a bunch of the little baby carrots into the mix)
3 ribs celery, chopped

Directions
Cut the roast into halves and make small slits in the top of each half. Insert a garlic slice into each slit. Coat the roast with a mixture of the flour, salt and pepper. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet and brown the roast on all sides in the hot oil. Place the roast in a 6-quart slow cooker and add the wine and onion. Mix the tomato sauce, brown sugar, oregano, prepared horseradish, prepared mustard, and bay leaf in a bowl and pour rover the roast. Add the potatoes, carrots and celery and cook, covered, on low for 8 hours. Discard the bay leaf before serving.

Recipe originally published in Tables of Content, from the Junior League of Birmingham, AL.