Crock Pot or Slow Cooker?

After talking to a few people, I decided that it might be good to have a Q & A Day to answer some of questions that you might have...

If you have a question, please email me and I will add it to my Q & A Day and if I can't find or don't know the answer, then maybe a reader will...

One question I get all the time is:

What's the difference between a crock pot and a slow cooker?

The simple answer:

Basically, they are the same difference...in other words, the are a lot alike, but have aren't the same...

Crock pots..

• have a lid (usually glass), a 'crock' insert that is made of either ceramic or porcelain, and a heating container that the crock fits into
• the heating container heats your food from all sides continuously
  
• usually have the temperature settings of LOW (200' F), HIGH (300' F) and sometimes WARM.
• are usually the better choice if you aren't going to be home during the cooking

Slow Cookers...

• also have a lid, but their 'crock' is usually called a 'cooking pot' and instead of fitting inside a heating container, it sits on a heating base
• the heating base can usually be used as a small griddle
• the cooking pot is heated only from the bottom, but it does not continuously heat, instead it turns itself on and off. It gets to the temperature setting you have it set on and then it cuts off, it gets below that temperature it cuts itself back on
  
• temperature settings are numbered from 1-5

Now a crock pot can be a slow cooker, but a slow cooker can never be a crock pot...so if you have a recipe that says "put ingredients in your crockpot" then you need to use a crock pot...but if your recipe says "put ingredients in your slow cooker" then you can use either one.

Hope that helps...

So do you have a crock pot or a slow cooker or both? Which do you like better and why?

Hugs and Happy Slow Cooking...