For more information or to register for any of the events or meetings please call the extension office at (701) 683-6128.

• Fast Meals with Slow Cooking class
  

Fast Cooking with Slow Meals

Fast Cooking with Slow Cookers Class

Imagine walking in the door to the smell of your supper ready to eat or its’ hot outside so you don’t want to start the oven when something hot to eat sounds good.  Crockpot cooking may be for you.  Deb Lee, Ransom County Extension Agent, presented a lesson entitled, “Fast Food with Slow Cookers”, the perfect answer to the above mentioned scenarios.

Topics discussed include advantages of slow cookers, a slow cooker test for safety, slow cooker food safety tips, handling leftover and adapting traditional cooking times to the slow cooker.

Common slow cooker mistakes:  USDA does not recommend cooking large cuts of meat in slow cookers.  They stay in the “danger zone” between 40 and 140 degrees for too long.  Potential food-borne disease-causing bacteria could multiply to substantial numbers.  Large cuts should be cut into smaller chunks, allowing them to heat through and pass through the danger zone more quickly.  Another common mistake is putting frozen food in the crockpot.  Food should be thawed ahead of time.  Frozen ingredients endanger the safety of the food and changing cooking times by hours. 

The favorite part of the lesson for participants was tasting samples of several crockpot dishes.  It appears there may be an increase in crockpot use in some kitchens in the county.  They will be walking in the door to the smell of supper and their house will remain cool!