Oh boy! I won this cool little 4 quart slow cooker from West Bend. My friend’s mom has two actually and I just love the thing. It has this little detachable pan, with a nice glass lid that doubles as a cassarole pan. And the heating element is also a little griddle, perfect for a pair of french toast slices or pancakes and then a little scrambled eggs. You can roast in it, cook and boil in it, you can even use it like a little electric skillet. And best of all, you can pop the lid on and place it in the frig with leftovers and just warm it up the next day.

I love these little appliances that do a bunch of things with very little wasted electricity and heat. Believe it or not, we don’t have a big old stove. No range or cooktop, oven, whatever you want to call it. Haven’t had one since we moved in. Almost a year and a half. I have about 6 little appliances that I use for every day cooking. Crock pot… a big favorite around here. A large toaster oven…. good for cookies and most of the ‘oven’ type cooking. Got a breadmaker, love that. And a Presto Pot… great for cooking in oil, or for boiling a pot of pasta… it’s super fast. Great for soups too. Faster than the crock pot. We have a super nice rice cooker that makes gooooooood rice like the Chinese restaurants. We have a little single hot plate burner, but to be honest, we use that less and less now. And last but not least, we have a regular large electric skillet… which I love, but often for just me or for the three of us, it’s a little overkill.

And now, we’ll have the little West Bend Cooker.

I know some folks think you shouldn’t have single use appliances… like say, the rice cooker. But I love it. And we use it at least twice a week or more. We like rice. And we don’t seem to do very well with the hot plate and pan method. This little cooker is like fool proof. And it will hold the cooked rice warm after it’s done. It doesn’t draw much electricity, and it’s very reasonable to purchase and so far after many years, it’s still going strong. It’s a simple beast. And there are few parts, bells and whistles to go wrong. And I see them on Ebay or garage sales all the time. If it goes, I can replace it for less than $20.

When I first realized that I would need a stove/oven here at the moby, I started to price the things. And new? Pretty expensive if you wanted something nice. And used, well, still kind of pricey. I had these other things and thought, why don’t I try and use them and see if I can get by a week or two… well, that week or two turned into a year or so! And I’m just as happy as I can be.

We will even cook a small turkey in our little table top toaster oven! Works great! I could pop it in my crockpot too… might take a couple days thought! HAHA.

But I am happy to get my little Cooker Plus…. can’t wait for it come and join the little herd of efficient appliances!