I don’t mind spending time in the kitchen but the less time I spend in there the better for me.  A slow cooker is an amazing appliance that every family large or small should own.  I love hearing and learning about appliances great and small and the Kenmore Bloggers Summit 2012 was full of information along with my dream Refrigerator Kenmore Elite Trio Refrigerator with Grab-N-Go door.  Kenmore had none other than Suzy Singh from Master Chef share a few cooking tips and ideas with cooking with a slow cooker.  I loved listening to her cooking tips and inside secrets.

Few slow cooker cooking tips:

1. EverNote is a great Recipe app
2. Cooking meat or chicken in a slow cooker for 10+ hour you can easily shreds meat
3. Don’t add too much water when cooking in slow cooker or crock pot. The steam from the meal builds and will make enough juice.
4. The colors that make a meal look appetizer or white, red, green.
5. Taking the lid off to stir release valuable steam and flavors. No need to stir. Add ingredients, set it and forget it.

Homemade Yogurt: Pint of whole milk, warm in microwave 32 min. sit until luke warm. Add a table spoon of Dannon’s yogurt put it in oven let it sit over night.  Refrigerate in the morning.

After Suzy finished sharing tips we were then let in on a little secret.

Blogger’s SLOW COOKER Challenge!

Prior to arriving at the Kenmore studio we had signed up in groups. Our Group we named the Fox Force Five. I was grouped with some fantastic Mom bloggers and some pretty awesome Dad bloggers.

Louise who I absolutely adore blogs at MomStart,  Tanis from The Redneck Mommy,  Jim  from Busy Dad Blog, Shawn from Backpacking Dad,  C. C from  C.C. Chapman  and me made up the Fox Force Five.  Which is actually quite comical if you think about it since there was 6 of us.  If you have never meet any of them know they are all wonderful and funny and especially entertaining as a group. I had so much fun. We worked well together as a group especially for the Video commercial challenge with killer dirty talking under garments (don’t ask where we found these) and a Kenmore Canister Vacuum held by Louise who comes in to save the day  (we were actually runners up in this competition). I wish I had footage to show you it was classic.  

There were approximately 6 groups totally 36 bloggers. We were given a the same set up of fresh vegetables and spices to choose from along with 1 special ingredient to use if we chose or we can trade with another group. With the majority having all the same items it would be a challenge to make ours different from the others.  Our secret ingredient was we chose to add soy sauce, red wine and sugar along with a few other spices to our chopped vegetables.   They gave us 30 minutes to prepare then once the lid was put on we set it and forget it.

Several hours later all six stews went head to head for a taste testing challenge. Our Stew had a special Asian flair taste to it and we were named as the Winners of the Kenmore Bloggers Slow Cooker Challenge.  For winning the challenge we were all provided with a  Kenmore Simmer Slow Cooker prize delivered directly to our homes.

A little information about the Kenmore Slow Cookers used in the challenge

KenmoreSimmer

• 7 Quart slow cooker also includes half-quart warmer
• Large family size capacity
• easy to read digital controls
• removable  ceramic for simple dishwasher safe clean up
• Convenient cook setting including a “keep warm”

I can’t wait to use my slow cooker to make my first ever pot of Chili.

Visit Kenmore Live Studio at  Kenmore Live Studio Livestream Channel where you’ll find amazing chefs and fashion designers show.  Be sure to check out the Kenmore YouTube channel

Follow Kenmore @KenmoreConnect and on Facebook.

disclosure:  Many thanks to Kenmore for inviting me to attend the Kenmore Summit 2012 held in Chicago. Accommodations and small appliance was provided for attending. Thoughts are 100% my honest opinion.