Slow Cookers and Food Safety

At any time of year, a slow cooker can make life a little more convenient. They help keep foods hot during winter celebrations, and keep our homes cool in the summertime, but is a slow cooker safe?

Yes. Direct heat from the pot, lengthy cooking times and steam generation under a tightly-covered lid are effective tools for destroying bacteria. To get the most out of your slow cooker, and keep you family's food safe, however, there are a few things to think about.

Safe Beginnings

A common sense step that always bears repeating is that we have to begin with a clean cooker, clean utensils and a clean work area. Always wash your hands before and during food preparation, being careful not to transfer raw food debris from your prep steps to the knobs and lid handles you will need to touch later.

Keep perishable foods refrigerated until prep time. If you cut up meat and vegetables in advance, make sure to store them separately in the refrigerator. The slow cooker may take several hours to reach a safe, bacteria-killing temperature, so make sure bacteria isn't given an opportunity to multiply rapidly at room temperature while you are assembling other ingredients.

Thaw Ingredients

Always thaw meat or poultry before putting it into a slow cooker. While it is safe to cook from frozen on a stove or in a microwave, it is not safe to cook from frozen in a slow cooker. The food will stay too long in the temperature danger zone, and bacteria will reproduce quickly. Foods that work best in a slow cooker have a high moisture content, like chilis, soups, stews or spaghetti sauce.

Dump and Go?

One of the most convenient things about a slow cooker is that everything can be dumped in at once, right? No! Vegetables usually cook slower than meat and poultry, and fresh vegetables usually need to cook slower than fresh vegetables, so it seldom works to throw all ingredients in at once.

Settings

Most cookers have two or more settings. Foods take different times to cook depending upon the setting used. Certainly, foods will cook faster on high than on low. However, for all-day cooking or for less-tender cuts, you may want to use the low setting.

If possible, turn the cooker on the highest setting for the first hour of cooking time and then to low or the setting called for in your recipe. However, it is safe to cook foods on low the entire time — if you are leaving for work, for example, and preparation time is limited.

While food is cooking and once it is done, food will stay safe as long as the cooker is operating.

Power Out

If you are not at home during the entire slow-cooking process and the power goes out, throw away the food even if it looks done. If you are at home, finish cooking the ingredients

immediately by some other means: on a gas stove, on the outdoor grill or at a house where the power is on. When you are at home, and if the food was completely cooked before the power went out, the food should remain safe up to two hours in the cooker with the

power off.

Handling Leftovers

Store leftovers in shallow covered containers and refrigerate within two hours after cooking is finished. Reheating leftovers in a slow cooker is not recommended. Cooked food should be reheated on the stove, in a microwave, or in a conventional oven until it reaches 165 °F. Afterwards, the hot food can be placed in a preheated slow cooker to keep it hot for serving—at 135 °F or above, as measured with a food thermometer.

QUICK TIPS:

• Thaw meat or poultry before putting it into a slow cooker

• Make sure the cooker is plugged in and turned on

• Keep the lid in place between periodic stirrings

• Consult the instruction booklet when using large cuts of meat and poultry

• Cook raw veggies before adding meat & poultry

• Using liquids such as broth, water or barbecue sauce help with even heating

• Make sure you use a thermometer to check for doneness in the thickest part of the food

  • Vegetables and Fruits: 135° F or higher for 15 seconds

  • Whole muscle meats: 145° F or higher for 15 seconds

  • Ground meats: 155° F or higher for 15 seconds

  • Poultry: 165° F or higher for 15 seconds

The above information is courtesy of the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service and the Food and Drug Administration.