What a crock

At home we recently got a new slow cooker (a.k.a. crock-pot), but I have to say I'm very disappointed. We've cooked several recipes in it and each was overcooked. I noticed with the crock pot set to low the contents were boiling. I'm sorry, it should not boil on low.

From what I can tell this is true of all new crock pots. Apparently manufactures have increased the cooking temperatures by about 20 degrees. So whereas low used to be about 185 degrees it's now 205, and high went from about 200 to 220. This change angers me. Most crock pot recipes are designed to cook at a certain temperature for a certain length of time. But by increasing the temperature now all recipes won't cook the same without guesstimating how much to decrease the cook time. Also, shorter cook times mean you can't put the food in before you leave for work and come home to a hot dinner. Instead you'll come home to a burned dinner.

Why did they do this you ask? Good question. Everything I've read says manufactures were afraid of being sued because the slower cooking crock pots left food in the "danger zone" longer. The "danger zone" being 40 degrees to 140 degrees, the temperatures most likely to encourage bacterial growth. But this is being overly paranoid. As long as you let the food cook completely there's nothing to worry about. If I take food out of the oven early before it's finish cooking I could get sick. But is that the ovens fault? No, it's my own stupid fault. The same is true with crock pots.

As you can tell I'm a little peeved here. I really enjoy crock pot cooking, but this new crock pot is going to make that difficult. If I ever find a crock pot with actual temperature control (not just low/high) I'll buy one. And if you have an older crock pot, pray that is lasts a long time.