WELCOME TO OUR KITCHEN: We're talking about what's happened with the slow cooker!

·20 min·2 clips

Bruce and Mark reveal how a Jewish Sabbath tradition in 19th-century Lithuania led to the invention of the slow cooker.

The episode begins with hosts Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough introducing themselves as cookbook authors working on their 37th book. They start with a one-minute cooking tip about saving oil from tinned anchovies, sardines, or tuna packed in olive oil to enhance sauces and stews with umami. The main topic is the history and evolution of slow cookers, also known by the brand name Crock-Pot. They explain that the slow cooker was invented by Irving Naxon, an immigrant and Western Electric's first Jewish engineer, who patented the Naxon Beanery in 1940. The idea originated from a Jewish tradition in Vilnius, Lithuania, where people would place crocks of food in bakery ovens after Friday baking to cook slowly over Shabbat. In 1970, Naxon sold his invention to Rival, which rebranded it as the Crock-Pot and launched it at a 1971 housewares show in Chicago, leading to massive sales. The hosts describe how slow cookers work, with an outer casing heating an inner crockery or metal container. They discuss safety concerns, noting that fire departments advise against leaving slow cookers unattended due to risks from faulty cords or outlets. A key point is that original slow cookers cooked at low temperatures (120-140°F), which fall within the USDA's danger zone for bacterial growth, making them potentially unsafe by modern standards. Modern slow cookers cook much hotter, with high settings reaching 200-300°F, requiring adjustments to old recipes. Mark shares his personal use of slow cookers for chili and overnight oatmeal, including a specific recipe for steel-cut oats with a 5:1 water-to-oats ratio. They also mention that slow cookers can degrade capsaicin in spicy ingredients, necessitating extra additions. The episode concludes with segments on their newsletter, Facebook group, and what's making them happy in food this week, such as lamb kofta and lemon marmalade.

As heard by us

A warm, slightly cautionary tour of slow cookers, kitchen safety, and lemon marmalade.

Slow cookers get a kitchen-table history as Bruce Weinstein and Mark Skrubber trace the appliance's beginnings, its long middle life, and the ways newer models have changed.

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Want to know why old slow cookers sounded almost like sous vide, until the safety math caught up?

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