Make It Fast, Cook It Slow (37 page)

CHERRIES JUBILEE

serves
4

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 2-quart slow cooker. Whisk the cornstarch with the melted butter until fully incorporated. Drain the cans of cherries, and add to the stoneware. Pour in cornstarch mixture. Add the sugar and lemon zest; no need to stir. If you’re going to add brandy, do so now. Cook on high for 2 hours, and serve hot over vanilla ice cream. I made two batches, one with and one without brandy. The brandy batch tasted like there was brandy in it; I wouldn’t serve that one to children.

CHOCOLATE-COVERED STRAWBERRIES AND APPLES

serves
8

The Ingredients

Use a 2-quart slow cooker. Pour the chocolate chips into the crock. Cover and cook on high for 30 minutes to 1 hour.

While the chocolate is melting, wash and prepare the fruit, and line a few baking sheets with parchment paper. Check on the chocolate chips after 30 minutes. You will know the chocolate is ready to stir when it gets really shiny and begins to break down. You can start stirring even if the chip forms are still visible.

Dip fruit pieces into the melted chocolate. Put the covered fruit onto parchment paper-lined baking sheets and place in the refrigerator to harden. This doesn’t take long—I think we only waited about 20 minutes.

You can go totally fancy and have one slow cooker for semisweet chocolate, one for white, and one for milk. You can make little swirls with the different chocolates and double-dip to create culinary masterpieces. I’d really like to do this one day.

CHOCOLATE FRITO CANDY

serves
10

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 6-quart slow cooker. Put the Fritos and pretzels in a large ziplock freezer bag and smash until crumbly. Set aside. Line a 13x9-inch baking sheet with parchment paper. Set that aside, too.

Put the butter, brown sugar, peanut butter, and chocolate chips into your slow cooker, set on high, and cook for 1 to 2 hours, or until everything is really melty and you can mix it well.

Stir in pretzel and Frito pieces. Using oven mitts (Use them! The crock is hot!), dump the hot candy out onto your lined baking sheet and spread it out with a wooden spoon. Sprinkle the peanut pieces on top. Put sheet in the refrigerator for about 1 hour, or until the candy has set completely. Break the candy into pieces.

The Verdict

Whoa, mama! Man, these are amazing and wonderful and scary because they are
so
good you will hide pieces in your robe pockets and sneak into a corner of the garage to eat them by yourself.

CHOCOLATE MOUSSE

serves
6

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 4-quart slow cooker. Put the heavy cream, egg yolks, sugar, vanilla, and coffee into your crock. Mix until combined with a whisk. You don’t need to go crazy, just mix well. Add the chocolate chips. Cover and cook on high for about 1 hour, or on low for about 2 hours. You are looking for little bubbles in the surface of the cream and melted chocolate. VERY VERY VERY VERY carefully, pour the mixture into a blender. You’ll get about 2½ to 3 cups of liquid. Blend on high until it “grows” to about 5 to 6 cups, and doesn’t seem like it will rise any higher. Pour into serving dishes; I used wine glasses. Chill for 2 hours in the refrigerator. Top with whipped cream or berries, or nothing at all.

The Verdict

It’s not bad that I didn’t let the kids have any because it had coffee in it, right? That doesn’t make me mean, does it? They were already eating cake…We served this to company and everyone truly enjoyed it.

Something to note: the very top has a bit of a skin on it, and there are little bubbles that didn’t pop during the cooling process. I’ve been told this can be remedied by pressing plastic wrap directly on the mousse while it is chilling.

CRÈME BRÛLÉE

serves
4

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 6-quart slow cooker and a heat-resistant dish that fits all the way inside your stoneware. I use a 1½-quart casserole dish. Add water around the dish, until halfway up the side of the dish. (You are using the slow cooker as a bain-marie, or water bath.)

In a mixing bowl, whip together the eggs, cream, sugar, and vanilla. Pour the mixture into the dish, cover, and cook on high for 2 to 4 hours. The custard should be set with the center still a bit jiggly. Touch the surface lightly with your finger to check. Unlike an oven, it will be difficult to overcook this. Try not to worry.

Very carefully (use oven mitts!) remove the dish and let cool completely on the countertop, then chill in the refrigerator for 2 to 3 hours. Before serving, sprinkle raw sugar over the top and brown with a kitchen torch, or place under the broiler for 3 to 5 minutes, or until sugar has browned. Chill again before serving.

The Verdict

This is the dish I prepared on
The Rachael Ray Show
. I love that I can make such a decadent dish at home and eat it without having to spend $40 on a restaurant dinner. I’ve made it quite a few times and it always comes out perfectly.

DULCE DE LECHE

serves
2 to 8

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 4-quart slow cooker. Find an oven-safe dish to insert into your stoneware. You can use individual ramekins or a casserole dish. Carefully pour water all around the dish, until the water reaches three-quarters of the way up the sides of the dish. Open the cans of sweetened condensed milk and pour into the inserted dish(es). Cover and cook on low for 8 hours.

The Verdict

Mmm. Caramel pudding. I cook this overnight and serve it to the kids for breakfast with apple slices. Because that turns caramel into health food. Yes, it does.

PEACH COMPOTE

serves
6

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 2-quart slow cooker. Pit and slice (I didn’t peel) the peaches, and put into the stoneware. Cover with the brown sugar, brandy, butter, cinnamon, and vanilla. There is no need to melt the butter beforehand. Cover and cook for about 90 minutes to 2 hours. Serve over vanilla ice cream. The leftovers are fantastic stirred into oatmeal.

PEACH PIE

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 4-quart slow cooker. Put the peaches into the stoneware. In a separate bowl, mix the melted butter with the vanilla and the dry ingredients. Stir with a fork to combine; it will be crumbly. Pour the mixture on top of the peaches, and press down with your hands (or a spatula if you don’t want to get gooky). Cover and cook on high for 4 hours. The pie is done when it has begun to brown on the edges and the fruit is bubbly and has caramelized a bit.

The Verdict

Even though the top looked awfully crumby, the topping ended up being baked and a bit chewy like a traditional pie crust. I believe this simple dough can be used with any variety of fruit, canned or fresh, or with canned pie filling. We just happened to have a case of canned peaches in the garage.

PEANUT (NOT BRITTLE) CANDY

makes
3
pounds

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 6-quart slow cooker. Drop the 4 tablespoons of butter into your stoneware. Add sugar and corn syrup on top of the butter. Pour in the vanilla extract. Cover and turn to high for one hour. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

After an hour, stir to mix well. Add the baking soda. It will sizzle and make fun noises. Your sugar mixture will be milky-yellow and the sugar might still look granulated; that’s okay. Cover again and cook on high for another 30 minutes. Check and stir. Cover and cook again for another 15 to 30 minutes, or until the sugar mixture is brown and looks the color of peanut brittle. Stir in nuts. Then, using oven mitts, carefully (
carefully
! seriously—use the oven mitts!) pour half of the contents of the pot onto each baking sheet and spread out with a spatula. It will be lumpy (that’s because there are nuts). Let cool at room temperature for about 1 hour, then tear into pieces.

The Verdict

This tastes just like a PayDay candy bar. Everyone who tried it (ten of us, minus my cousin who for some reason doesn’t care for nuts) couldn’t get enough. It’s quite tasty. Prepare to be amazed.

PEANUT CLUSTERS

makes approximately
150
pieces

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 6-quart slow cooker. Spray the inside of your stoneware with cooking spray, and place the unwrapped baking chocolate and bars of German chocolate in the bottom. Add all the peanuts. Pour in the chocolate chips, and add the vanilla. Cover and cook on low for 3 hours, or high for about1½ hours.

While the chocolate is melting, lay out a bunch of parchment paper on your countertop or kitchen table. When the chocolate has melted, stir well, and remove from the heat. Use a small ice cream scoop to plop bite-size piles onto the parchment paper. Let cool before eating—it’ll take much longer than you want it to. It would be best to leave them overnight so you don’t pick at them. Package up and give away as soon as possible, or you’ll end up eating them all. Trust me.

The Verdict

These are addictive. The chocolate flavor is quite rich. If you aren’t a fan of dark chocolate, use milk chocolate chips. The salty flavor of the nuts is subtle, but is there, and it makes your tongue itch for more. And more. If you are allergic to nuts, try using pretzels. This candy makes a fantastic gift.

PUMPKIN PUDDING
(CRUSTLESS PUMPKIN PIE)

serves
6

The Ingredients

The Directions

Use a 4-quart slow cooker. Spray the inside of the stoneware with cooking spray. Set aside. In a mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients, and whisk until fully blended. No need to use a handheld or stand mixer, just some elbow grease. Pour the batter into the prepared stoneware. Cover and cook on high for 3 to 4 hours, or on low for about 6 hours. Check your “pie” after 2 hours on high, or 3 hours on low, then every 30 minutes. When fully cooked, the pie will look just like a finished pumpkin pie—the batter will have browned and cracked in a few places. The center will set enough
for you to touch it without getting gookies on your finger. Let sit in the stoneware until cooled to room temperature, then spoon into serving dishes and top with whipped cream.

The Verdict

Perfect. It tastes fantastic, is gluten-free, and terribly easy to do. My kids aren’t huge pie eaters, and have never shown any interest in pumpkin pie. Like, EVER. But my six-year-old convinced me that it’s the crust of the pie that she doesn’t like, and she likes the filling. And then her younger sister decided to say the exact same thing. This is better than my original plan, which was to pop open a can of pumpkin pie filling and hand out spoons.