Runny casseroles in slow cooker

[FrancesNiadova]

Can anyone offer any advice? It doesn't matter what recipe I follow, or even if I use a jar of cook in sauce, my casseroles in the slow cooker are always too watery. What am I doing wrong?

You should half the amount of liquid recommended in normal recipes, try that?

Take the lid off for the last half an hour maybe? Do you brown any meat first? I find that extract some of the excess water/fat in it.

No I don't brown the meat first, I just chuck it all in. DH is doing it all ATM as I'm in bed with leg up after surgery!
It doesn't matter if we make or buy a sauce, it always goes too watery.

What doesn't happen in a slow cooker is evaporation. The temperature doesn't really get hot enough for long enough to boil away the water and reduce the sauce. Using less liquid or boiling off the excess works. You also can add a flour/fat 'roux' paste to the juices at the end as a thickener. Another method is to stir in a paste of a heaped teaspoon or two of cornflour mixed with a very small amount of water. You can also add red lentils to the casserole before cooking and they will soak up the fluid. Changes the texture but not all that much.

The 'chucking' method is always a lottery. Try placing the pieces of meat in a plastic bag with a good tablespoon of seasoned flour and shaking them to coat them before frying off and adding to the casserole with a lot less liquid than in the recipe. The partially cooked flour sticking to the meat will thicken the sauce over time

Could add something like pearl barley towards the end to absorb some of the water?

You need to add very little liquid. So for example I would soften veg in oil and add any herbs or spices I was planning to use and transfer the veg to the slow cooker. I would then add meat to the pan and brown it and move that to the slow cooker. Then I would deglaze the pan with around a quarter of a cup of wine/stock etc. If I was planning on adding tomatoes, that would be the only liquid and I would crumble a stock cube in with the veg. If using home made stock I would reduce it a lot before adding to a slow cooker.

My current favourite thing is whole chicken in a slow cooker.

Yes, I like a whole chicken in a slow cooker, the meat falls off the carcass.

Q. If I add pearl barley or red lentils, do I have to boil them rapidly for 10 minutes first? (That would be a deal clincher in a morning!)

No preboiling needed.

Thanks, I'll suggest DH gives it a go!

I find that if I take the lid off for the last hour it is fine. I have tried using cornflower but it just goes into a white lump and doesn't thicken!

Cornflour is your friend. Mix a couple of tbsp with a little water and stir in. Boom.

Potato also thickens, and McDougals thickening granules are a lazy way of thickening anything in a rush.

I never add any liquid when I use the SC.

Stir in some SMASH, works really well.

If you use packet mixes, have you tried the Schwartz ones for slow cookers?

I get them in Tesco, there are a few.

If I haven't put enough flour on the meat to thicken things up I either bung in some pearl barley (that stuff could soap up a river), or if too late for that, then I stir in some gravy granules.

Agree with other advice about liquid; I used to add far too much and every meal was therefore too sloppy and thin. Despite what some slow cooker recipes say, you only need a little bit of liquid to cook the food. Also, I used to brown everything beforehand and then one day when very short of time decided to just chuck it all in ... Hey presto it tasted just as good, if not better.

I don't brown anything either. Flour if not using a packet mix. My problem us I always want to open and stir.

Try this

Chopped chicken pieces
jar of condensed mushroom soup - left condensed
tub of creme fresh

Bung it in sc switch on and leave.

Jars of sauce are meant to be used in the oven or on the hob, have you tried using just 1/2 a jar?

Try passatta as well. It goes really well with pork - just throw it in the sc with a packet of ribs.

If this happens I tend to remove the chunky bits with a slotted spoon (so they don't turn to mush), set aside and reduce the liquid on the hob. Then re-add the meat/veg.

A bit of a PITA but I tend to eat low carb so that means I don't have to add starchy thickeners

I don't add any stock at all, just a tin of tomatoes. If too runny I bung some little red lentils about an hour before I want to eat.

I use less than half the liquid given in a slow cooker recipe, a lot less for a normal casserole recipe.

Just bung some thickening granules in before serving.

I second the mcdougalls thickening granules, just stir them in.