That’s right, the Crock Pots are HOTTER
Over the past couple of years when we’ve chatted about slow cooker recipes on the blog, it is often mentioned that new slow cookers seem to cook food faster than the older models. Many of us have noticed that our meat is too mushy and/or we have to cut back the cooking time on some of our favorite recipes by several hours.
I’ve been holding on to the theory that maybe my recipes are turning out differently because I now own a larger, oval cooker with more surface area. But this week, reader Art sent me a link to an interesting article and discussion of this phenomenon on About.com. According to the writer, Linda Larson, slow cookers manufactured within the past 5 to 6 years have been made to cook at higher temperatures (200 degrees F on low; 300 degrees F on high) than older models.
Why would they want to mess with a good thing? Well, it has to do with food safety. Supposedly, someone somewhere got concerned that food was hanging around too long in the “danger zone” range of 40 to 140 degrees F, increasing the chances for bacterial growth. For the record, I’m all about avoiding food poisoning. But do you ever wonder if we are taking it a bit too far?
Now, our slow cooker dishes get nuked. Recipes that used to take 8 hours on low now take 5 hours on low, causing us to have to make a special trip home to cut it off, or start it later, or set a time and hope that holding it on “warm” for 4 hours isn’t going to turn it to mush. It completely defeats the purpose. And when we want to share a favorite slow cooker recipe with a friend, must we ask them the make, model and year of their slow cooker in order to specially tailor the cooking instructions to their appliance? How about some consistency here?
I believe the newer slow cooker models have a lot of great design features and have come a long way in terms of ease of cleaning, ability to be programmed and the like. I just wish they weren’t so dang hot!
Do you agree, or do you like the hotter models?
February 1, 2011 - 7:00 AM
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Yes! This is so true! My new crock pot also gets hotter on one side. I notice that the food (this week, potato soup) has actually stuck to the side of the crock at its hot spot. I got this one because the last new crock pot I owned didn’t have a lid that fit properly. Too much heat/moisture was escaping and the food would actually dry out. The “Smart Pot” by Rival only allowed 4 time settings (high 4 or 6 hours or low 8 or 10 hours) and turned itself off after the specified time. Things never turned out quite right. My parents still have an older model and it works perfectly, of course.
I like mine hotter, because I only use it on the weekends and I don’t get up early enough for the 8-hour version of dishes.
Mine is newer & it cooks things really fast, I usually do one hour on Hot and 3-4 hours on low and that will cook just about anything. I really do have to watch it, though, so it doesn’t overcook.
Thats interesting! I too wondered about oval vs. round cookers.
My girlfriend has 2 slow cookers, and I have one. We have had problems burning or over cooking some things from time to time.
I guess I will get a thermometer next time we use them and check the temps to see how hot them get on low. I bet all of our slow cookers are less than 10 years old.
I am VERY glad to see this article. I was thinking maybe I was losing my mind. I have to put my slow cooker on the lowest setting, which I think is something like “keep warm” or else it cooks WAY too fast. I wish I hadn’t replaced my old one, but it was in pretty sad shape (about 25 years old). I am not happy with the new one. Will keep watch at yard sales for the older models! Whew, I thought I’d really lost my mind. Thanks again for the article!
Whether you have an older model or a newer one just remember to plug it in after you set it up! Yesterday’s chicken soup lunch turned into chicken soup dinner when I realized I plugged in the coffee maker instead of the pot.
I agree Lindsey. The entire purpose of a slow cooker is the “set it and forget it” factor of being able to load up a meal before work or before going to bed and letting it cook for 8 or so hours before having to fool with it.
I ruined a big expensive piece of lamb in my crock pat last winter (probably stupid to use a slow cooker for a piece of meat like that anyway). I’ve gone to using it strictly for soups, stews, and other dishes in which the “mush” factor isn’t as offputting.
If I do something overnight, I can make it work on “warm” and still come down and find things bubbling in the morning.
Michelle, you make a good point that the hotter cooking does make Crock Pots a more accessible option on the weekends. I’ve started meals in the early afternoon and they were ready by about 7.
Unfortunately, the food police have managed to ruin a good thing. This is just another in the long line of warnings and guidelines that ignore reality.
When I watch a food show and listen to the dozen warnings the hosts make about ‘contamination from chicken’ or how I’m supposed to triple check the temp of some dish I’m cooking to make sure it gets to that perfect temperature – which is always OVER cooked! – I just grumble to myself about how the lawyers are making money off all of us.
I have frequently wondered why my slow cooker recipes always cooked way faster than expected, and now I know. Thank you Lindsey, this is a very important blog. Thanks very much…
I’ll agree with several others and say that I only do slow cooker recipes on the weekends. I wish I could do them otherwise, but I just can’t find recipes that cook so slow any more. Even slow cooker chili seems to be done in about four hours. I have trouble finding any recipe that doesn’t finish in about four hours or less.
I mean, that’s fine, I can adjust, but it really eliminates the option of prepping something in the morning, then having it for dinner at 6 pm…
Thanks for this article. I got the larger oval one a couple of years ago, and I too thought it was the size that was ruining some of my meals. One of them was an experience similar to Kristen’s, so I stopped using it after that.
I liked the temperature of the old models. These hotter, faster ones defeats the purpose of why I was using a crock to begin with.
I have nothing to contribute because I am fairly new to the crockpot game but I did want to say that I am making a yummy looking Chicken Taco Chili in my crockpot today! I can’t wait to get home and smell it cooking.
Hey Lindsey,
Your paragraph separator doesn’t seem to be working anymore. I thought it was for awhile, wasn’t it?
I’m grateful that my older (10 year+) Crock Pot is in good shape. I’ve just started using it so we can have dinner ready when we get home on a busy night with lots of kid-related commitments. The trick is I work with a 30-minute commute, so I HAVE to have the 8+ hour recipies take that long. As it is, they usually get 10 hours – I’ll have to keep this one in good shape as long as I can.
The older crock pots do a much better job. So glad I still have one.
@ Magpie, the paragraph separation went wrong the other day for some reason, but I think it’s fixed now – when I look at my blog entries, they are separated. Let me check on comments. Can you show me a specific example of where it is not working? That will help me get to the bottom of it. Sorry about the trouble!
We have a new All-Clad slow cooker and it cooks hotter than our older ones as well so have had to adjust most recipes accordingly. We have a smaller older one we use in the RV/Van (it fits in the sink so we can cook and while we travel)and it appears to cook at a lower temperature. At the point in time of this writing neither of us has died from food poisoning using either of them.
What I would really like is a slow cooker that I could choose the cooking temperature with a thermostat; seems like a no brainer to me. Following the logic of the manufacturers we’ll begin seeing ovens that cannot be set below 300º so we don’t somehow harm ourselves using lower temperatures to braise.
… and have just noticed that the graf sep is NOT working. In prev post had one following “… either of them.”
Good points, Harold.
Thanks for your input re: grafs. I have someone checking on this.
#15 Lindsey, it was my first comment in this thread and everyone before mine. Now the paragraphs are separated, but I’m seeing the comments spread across the whole page. I don’t think it’s my computer, because the other blogs are showing up fine.
And now it’s fine again.
I haven’t checked to see, but are there slow cookers available that have adjustable temp settings?
I have only looked at the basic function models – always round not oval, so I don’t know about the high end versions.
The paragraph separation is still not working. I was grousing about this over the weekend. As I mentioned in that post a few days ago, I am a nitpicker, but it does seem to be a marked improvement to me in legibility when the spacing is there.
I’ve had the same issue. One of the joys of a crock pot is being able to turn it on before I leave for work at 8am and having it ready when I get home at 5 or 6pm. But everything’s overdone now when you leave it that long. Bring back the old ones! I am very cautious with food safety probably from my college years working in restaurants, but really – how many of us died from food poisoning from using the old lower heat crock pots?
The technology gurus here at the RT are working on the blogs this week, I have learned. It has resulted in a few settings being changed. They’re gonna get things back to normal ASAP. Thanks for your patience, all!
Now, if you want to be impatient with your slow cooker, by all means…
“How many of us died from food poisoning from using the old lower heat Crock Pots?”
Good question.
Paragraph spacing is working again.
If you still don’t see it, press F5 or clear your cache and refresh.
“How many of us died from food poisoning from using the old lower heat Crock Pots?”
Good question.
Answer: None of us reading this blog … so far!
@Lindsey … “slow cooker” or the Editor types will refer you to AP Stylebook for a refresher on registered marks.
Oh, and F5 is no longer universal for refresh screen.
J, just as I said earlier, it’s the food police telling us how dangerous so many standard food practices have been for the last century.
Never eat pork that’s not been overcooked by at least 20 degrees internal temp, never deep fry a turkey, ground beef cooked to anything less than well done is a hazard, and fish needs to be cooked until it’s devoid of any moisture.
Folks, I have never washed my hands three times after handling chicken, and I have never worried about eating raw oysters. Somehow I’m still alive, so I guess I just win the food lottery on a monthly basis.
Oh, yeah, I make snow cream with a raw egg, too. Call me crazy, I guess I’m just ‘out there’…
Yes, Harold, Crock Pot is a brand name and slow cooker is a generic term for those appliances. That is why I always capitalize Crock Pot.
I was having a little fun with my blog entry title, but I know not everybody is familiar with Grateful Dead songs.
Probably some attorney involved somewhere representing some deviant of the McDonald’s Hot Coffee woman…it’s our wonderful lawsuit happy society that ruins most good things for the rest of the prudent minded population.
Here’s an interesting discussion about food safety: “Am I the only one who lives in a magic house? A lighthearted look at ourselves & food safety” http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/572415
And here’s a video on “How to Hack Your Slow Cooker” http://www.chow.com/videos#!/show/all/64330/how-to-hack-your-slow-cooker It’s about how to set up your slow cooker for sou vide cooking but is all about controlling the temperature of your slow cooker. So if you feel like frankensteining your over eager crock pots, this might point you in the right direction.
Dang it! The slow cooker link didn’t work. Use the link and then type slow cooker into the search. It’s the only video that will come up.
So, for ‘under $100′ I can make my slow cooker into a slow cooker? Yeah, that’s just what I need to put me in a better mood…
No offense, ORebecca, it’s not you, it’s just the thought that the gov’t is ‘helping’ me…
It’s called a SLOW cooker for a reason!! The only reason I still have my newer model oval crockpots (3 and 6 qt sizes) is because roasts and whole chickens fit so nicely in oval pots. But the excess heat is a bummer
Even cooking on low can sometimes turn a meal to mush! Watch for increasing prices at yard sales for the vintage models 
No abdnva, for under $100 you can modify your slow cooker for sou vide techniques and control the temperature. For under $10 you can go to a charity shop, pick up a vintage slow cooker and defy the government.
I looked at some reviews on line and found that the
Hamilton Beach SET & FORGET Model # 33967 had a warning that it might take too long to get over 140 degrees. This sounds like the old style SLOW COOKER that we all yearn for!
It was top-rated, except for the warning about actually being a slow cooker.
Hey Tom K, thanks for that info!
I just went to Amazon, and the that slow cooker Tom mentioned looks great!
It also has this- “The included thermometer probe takes the guesswork out of slow cooking. After reaching the desired internal food temperature, the slow cooker automatically shifts to keep-warm.”
Here’s the link to it: http://www.amazon.com/Hamilton-Beach-Forget-6-Quart-Programmable/dp/B001AO2PXK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1296833501&sr=8-1
That’s a really nice-looking slow cooker. Not a bad price, either. Thanks for the info, Tom!
You can find the slow cooker at Walmart and Target. Ironically, it has only a 3.5 star rating at Target.
Jon, as for the coffee lawsuit, conduct an online search for Liebeck v. McDonald’s Restaurants, P.T.S., Inc. in order to get the facts.
Hallelujah, I thought I had lost my mind. I got rid of my 38 year old original Rival crock pot, concern for age and fire potential, even though it was working great! I have dreams of the trash person setting it back on my front porch, obviously being smarter than me and realizing I had made a mistake-ugh! Would love to hear from anyone who has used the pot TomK mentions.
I don’t want to be just a weekend Crock Potter (that’s when I have time to cook).
300F on high is pure baloney.
Water boils at 212F. If you attempted to heat the water in the Crock Pot to 300F it would be at a rolling boil. Over 4 or 5 hours a lot of it would boil away.
My CuisineArt slow cooker documentation says its high is 212F. That’s credible.
Yes, a normal oven can be set to 300F and a casserole dish containing liquid be put inside. But the liquid in the dish will still not exceed 212F in temperature. To get it any higher you need a pressure cooker.
I just stumbled onto this post few days ago, But I agree that the new Crock Pots are cooking to hot. So I set out on mission to find an older model Rival CP. So I went searching every Thrift store from my hometown(Fairlawn) to Carrol County, Montgomery, and finally to Roanoke where I scored an early 70′s model 3 1/2 quart with a glass lid for $5 bucks at a junk shop beside the True Value hardware store on Williamson rd. I tested it with water 2/3 full for 8 hours on low and the temp was 190 degrees. So to the folks on here who got rid of their old one I may just have found it.
Nice find, Lee.
Since this post ran, I accidentally broke my Crock Pot and had to buy a new one. Oddly, this new one does not seem to cook as fast as the one I had before.
Lindsy, I’m interested in the brand name of the new one you bought? And how many quarts is it as I’m
interested in getting a bigger oval one if it cooks slower.
@Lee, let me check when I go home. I know the one I broke was a Crock Pot brand, but I can’t recall whether I replaced it with another Crock Pot or if the new one is something else. Stay tuned.
Lee, my new slow cooker is a Hamilton Beach with a lock-down lid.
I don’t like the new hotter crock pots at all! I broke my old one and bought a new 4 quart oval model. It turned everything to mush. So, I bought an old Rival 3150 model for $2 at a thrift store, I tested it for safety, and it works like crock pot magic.
Ah, the nanny state strikes again! Just because a few people don’t have enough sense to follow directions about food preparation (or read directions in the first place), we all have to suffer. At least now that I work from home I don’t have to worry about leaving my crockpot unattended all day, but I don’t dare put any chicken dish in it for more than 2 1/2 hours or it will turn to mush.