How To Determine The Best Slow Cooker Size For Your Kitchen

Slow cookers are handy gadgets, and there are lots of easy recipes you can make in a slow cooker while you tend to other things. However, unlike regular ovens and stoves, a good slow cooker sadly does not come pre-installed in a household kitchen. If you want one, you'll need to buy one, and once you start looking you're going to find lots of different models for sale. To get a few good reference points on what to look for, we spoke to Coco Morante, recipe developer and author of "The Instant Kitchen Meal Prep Cookbook".

Most slow cookers are measured by how many quarts fit into the central pot (also called a crock, hence the Crock-Pot brand name) where you place your food. According to Morante, "Six-quart slow cookers will suit most people's needs. If you're a household of one or two, though, and you aren't a fan of lots of leftovers, a three or four-quart size is best." Slow cookers also come in even larger sizes, and you'll find up to 10-quart slow cookers by major brands. Morante explained that unless you're regularly cooking for more than four or five people, a cooker that's larger than six quarts probably isn't worth the money or counter space. Don't worry about food size, since bulky meat cuts are just one of the foods that don't belong in a slow cooker anyway.

If you're still unsure about the best slow cooker for your kitchen, think about how much food you can reasonably fit into a slow cooker. To be safe, you don't want to jam six quarts-worth of food into a six-quart cooker. According to Coco Morante, "Filling your slow cooker one-half to two-thirds of the way full will ensure that the food cooks evenly, comes up to temperature properly, and stays in the pot rather than overflowing." Overfilling is one of the big slow cooker mistakes that can ruin your food, and even Crock-Pot warns against loading its slow cookers beyond three-quarters full. You'll have to consult the specific recipes you use to see if it'll all fit into the slow cooker size you're considering (Remember, there are four cups in a quart).

Besides capacity, there's one other consideration: how big is your kitchen counter, and how much clutter is already there? A standard six-quart slow cooker can be almost a foot and a half long, and a foot wide. According to Morante, "Slow cookers can take up a decent amount of real estate in your kitchen. If you're planning on keeping it out on the counter at all times (or have limited storage space), you'll want to take the footprint into consideration." There's nothing wrong with keeping slow cookers in a cupboard to free up space, but consider using a lower storage space — they're heavier than they look when you pull them off a high shelf.