Crock-pot 4.7l Gloss Black Digital Countdown Slow Cooker

I looked at loads of reviews before choosing a slow cooker.Although I live on my own, I did want a cooker that would accommodate a reasonable sized joint of meat, and I knew I could freeze any surplus food. I chose one with a countdown timer as I'm not always sure when I'll be back home.The cooker seems well built - with a big heavy ceramic inner pot. On first use there was a slightly disconcerting smell of warm electrics coming from the control panel - it has settled but I can still smell warm electrics if I put my nose close to it - guess that's inevitable. The pot does get hot on the outside - so make sure nothing meltable is touching it.The pot is large - my second meal was a 3.5kg piece of pork - but I have found that as long as it is at least half full of cooking juice- it seems to work fine. The timer is easy to use - you can switch from high to low whenever you want - but it would have been nice to be able to have say - one hour on high and then the rest on low...maybe I'm asking too much.It cooks beautifully - and I am very pleased with the meals I have made. The pork was super succulent after 7-8hrs, I've made ribs & beans and that was a great success too. It converted a little tray of lamb bones into a magnificent tagine.One curious fact about slow cooking - with the pork - there was virtually no fat in the juices - it remained on the pork and was tasteless! It seems to have extracted all the yummy fat flavour but left the fat in situ. The lamb dish did shed much fat, but that was easily skimmed off leaving a delicious sauce. You may find it best to decant the cooking juices and reduce them on a normal stove to concentrate the flavours.I've yet to use it while I'm out as I can never get up early enough to do the prep!!!All in all it seems to be a great buy - either for a family, or a lone greedy guts like me! I look forward to weekends even more now - as I plan what other hapless bit of meat will be the next offering to my crock-pot!

Absolutely fantastic slow cooker and well worth the money. I had picked this one out a long time ago but hesitated and it sold out. I signed up to the John Lewis email alert but never received anything and by chance happened to search for it again one day and found it on here for half the price it is being sold for at JL!I had read other reviews that it burnt food so on its first use we made a stew and set it on low for the day. We were disappointed with the result and it was still very watery and tough. Now we set it on high for 4 - 5 hours and it is perfect. Stew, loin, ribs and curry have all come out great and it takes so little effort. It is helpful if you can stir it every so often as bits around the outside may burn, but it's nothing to worry about if not.You can also adjust the temperature from low to high or high to low at any time while it's cooking if you change your mind, and you can adjust the timing too without any phaffing around stopping and restarting it which was a great bonus. The keep warm function is great too but maybe a quiet beep would be handy to let you know when it's done.Overall I'm very happy with it and have already recommended it to anyone who will listen!

Having owned a very large Morphy Richards slow cooker years ago and not used it very often (eventually sold it), I was a little anxious about buying another. I needn't have worried as this slow cooker is superb!We stopped eating processed foods for main meals nearly two years ago and this meant that we were making all our dinners from scratch - even down to the stock we used. As some stock recipes call for the bones to be cooked for 24 hours, I decided it was time to invest in a new one. Having looked at many reviews, I decided that one with a countdown timer would be the most useful for us. Since buying it I have cooked up beef stock (24 hours), chicken stock (12 hours), slow roasted joints of pork (16 hours and then roasted in the oven for a superb crackling), vegetable tagines (5 hours), curries and soups.Pros:Is a perfect size for us (a family of 4).Doesn't take up too much room in my (minute) kitchen (although it can't stay out on the side when it's idle as I literally have zero space on my kitchen side).Cooks well and at a good rate, with meals coming out wonderful and flavoursome.Pot and lid go in the dishwasher.Cons:Not big enough to do a double portion of dinner (not many leftovers after we've dished up!)Is fairly fragile (I have chipped it the teeniest bit on the outside - just cosmetic, but annoying nonetheless!)Overall, I am super pleased with my purchase and this has become one of my essential kitchen items.

My first crock pot and I love it. I haven’t been too adventurous yet with it - so far we have made jacket potatoes, whole chicken, chicken thighs, lamb, and beef. The chicken thighs are gorgeous in here and make a cheap cut of meat really tender and delicious. The thing that we love most about it is we can pop our food in there in the morning, set the timer and when we return home from work we have a nice hot meal cooked which is useful when the family comes home at different times of the day, we can just help ourselves. The keep warm function is great and keeps food hot rather than lukewarm which I was worried about. It’s really easy to clean - it can leave crusty food on the sides but is so easy to clean by putting washing up liquid and water in the bowl and setting it to high. In an hour the food just wipes off. 10/10 for us, can’t wait to try other recipes in here!