Slow Cookers – The Working Moms Best Friend

Hello Working Moms Over 40,

Here’s a suggestion from Katie-Anne, a successful work at home mom.

"As a working mom with a family to cook for, I’m always constantly stressed about providing a good meal for my kids and ubby to eat at supper time. Finance is only a small part of the stress.

For the most part the stress is related to not having enough energy to start cooking something when I’ve finished my day’s work. Recently however, the stress was completely removed and the quality of supper meals in my home improved dramatically.

Why? How? A new slow cooker in my kitchen!

I’ve seen these around and considered buying one but then thought “how many stews/casseroles can one make in a week” but reading a cookery book a couple of months ago made me realize that there’s more than soups and stews can be made in a slow cooker.

In fact, there’s a whole range of meals that you can prepare in there, and so was delighted to receive one as a gift.

Instead of the usual thrown-together meals, I decide what meat will be the basis of supper the next day and search a couple of websites for free recipes that contain that meat.

This takes all of 5 minutes – to locate and scribble down ingredients. Then I take the meat out of the freezer to defrost overnight and line up any other things that will be needed for the meal in preparation for the next morning.

As I prepare breakfast each day, I take a quick look at the recipe list and assemble the required things that couldn’t stay out of the fridge overnight and place everything into the slow cooker in the order suggested in the recipe.

Again, even with vegetable preparation, this is no more than a 10 minute job – often less than 5 minutes – and then turn the dial to low heat, push the slow cooker back on the counter top and forget about it.

When I come home from work each day, or stop work if I’m being a work at home mom instead of working outside the home that day, supper organization is a breeze. With a quick stir, I take the cooked meal out of the slow cooker, clean the removable crock-pot and replace it back in the slow cooker ready for use the next day, and serve up supper.

It’s that simple.

For those who enjoy making meals, this might not hold much attraction, but for those working moms like me, for whom supper preparation is an added stress they don’t need, slow cookers can be your best friend, and with recipes ranging from pot roast beef, to pork with apples and onto BBQ chicken, you can have it all – and once you’ve done the 15 minutes of preparation (including finding the recipe!), it’s like coming home to a meal that someone else has cooked – and all you have to do is dish it up!"

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