Best Slow Cooker On The Market 2016

Cuisinart 3-in-1 — Credit: Reviewed / Betsey Goldwasser

Crock-Pot Best Value — Credit: Reviewed / Betsey Goldwasser

How We Tested Slow Cookers

Best slow cookers side-by-side — Credit: Reviewed / Betsey Goldwasser

The Tester

I'm Bethany, an avid home cook constantly looking for ways to make more leftovers to take to work for the week. That's one of the reasons why slow cookers are so appealing to me—I actually already owned one, even before writing this article. I've tested pressure cookers, rice cookers, ice cream makers and more for Reviewed in the past.

I also grew up with a slow cooker. My parents used one frequently to prepare meals for our family when I was young. A common sight in our kitchen was my mother preparing ingredients the night before and putting them in the ceramic pot to leave in the fridge overnight. She would then pop the pot into the base in the morning, turn it on, and let it cook while we went to school and she to work. So I'm already familiar with slow cookers and the miracles they work, and was curious to see if they'd changed much in the 15-plus years since my childhood.

Testing slow cookers — Credit: Reviewed / Bethany Kwoka

The Tests

Reviewed first tested slow cookers in 2016 before the Instant Pot craze really took hold, so we wanted to update our ranking and see how these digital slow cookers compared in 2019. Assuming that every top-rated slow cooker could achieve the basics, our tests aimed to delve a bit deeper and ask questions related to their practicality. Ultimately, we ran the same four tests on each, ranking them each on how the final product turned out, how easy or not they were to use, and whether cleaning posed a challenge. It doesn't matter how well something cooks—if it's impossible to clean, I'm only going to use it once.

The first test was chili. This was my baseline, establishing that the slow cooker could perform as advertised. The second test was lasagna. Would each slow cooker be able to handle layers of noodles, sauce, cheese, and chopped veggies? The third test was tomato sauce. If I kept a jar of tomato sauce on warm for six hours, would it be burnt and tasteless, or would it be perfectly warm and flavorful? The final test was melting chocolate. Chocolate is notoriously finicky to melt properly, and whether the slow cookers burned the chocolate—or if it hardened up again once the cooker was changed to "keep warm"—would be a good test of each cooker's heating element.

After these tests, I also looked at each cooker subjectively. Beyond cooking prowess, did the cooker have any special features like handles to easily carry it to a potluck or a temperature probe to check the heat inside the pot? How easy or difficult was it to use? For me, the whole point of a slow cooker is to make my life easier. If running the slow cooker was going to be a challenge, I didn't want to use it. How easy or difficult was it to clean? Are the inner pots dishwasher-safe?

For this round of testing, we only compared slow cookers with digital controls. — Credit: Reviewed / Kyle Looney

What You Should Know About Slow Cookers

Slow cookers have been around since the 1970s, though an earlier iteration hit shelves as early as the 1950s. And their basic construction has remained largely unchanged. (If it ain't broke don't fix it, right?)

In general, a slow cooker is made up of three parts: An inner cooking pot—often made of porcelain or glazed ceramic—with handles, a glass lid, and an outer housing that contains an electric heating element at the bottom. Often, cookers can be turned to a few settings: "Keep Warm," Low, Medium, and High. And you can set them to cook in half-hour increments.

Because the lid doesn't create a high-pressure seal, there's no safety concern around sudden releases of steam. And as long as you follow the instructions and take a few common-sense precautions, like keeping the slow cooker on a non-wooden surface away from the wall and making sure there's enough water inside, there's no problem with leaving it on all day while you're at work. This makes slow cookers the ideal appliance for dinner-ready meals on weeknights.

Why Should I Buy A Slow Cooker?

The best slow cookers tend to make enough food to feed a family. Or, to feed one or two people dinner and lunch the next few days. This makes them perfect for those with busy schedules who just don't have the time or energy to cook everyday. Personally, I also see my slow cooker as a cost-saver. Because I'm making budget-friendly dishes in bulk, I'll take the leftovers for lunch and avoid the overpriced salads and bowls by my office.

If you're considering a slow cooker, you're probably also looking at pressure cookers. Many pressure cookers also have slow cook functions, though I find they don't work quite as well. We wrote a complete rundown of the difference between slow cookers, pressure cookers, and multicookers.

Other Slow Cookers We Tested

Meet the tester

Bethany Kwoka

Contributor

Bethany is a freelance contributor for Reviewed. An avid home baker and aspiring home cook, she reviews and writes mostly about kitchen gadgets (with the occasional fitness review thrown in). Her specialty might be fancy desserts, but she's never met a batch-cooked dinner recipe she didn't like.

Outside of her work for Reviewed, Bethany is a content creator working on clean energy and climate change at a regional non-profit and runs a tabletop game at her local comic book shop.

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