Ultimate Oatmeal with Honey and Figs

Happy Birthday QS! DG

Aw, thanks so much! I'm looking forward to a year of delicious and healthy cooking, and sharing it with all of you. QS

This looks delicious! We enjoy steel cut oats cooked overnight in the crockpot à la Alton Brown, but this is going to join my list of "things to try" - right after I add the cookbook to "things to buy"!

Hi there, Milk_Maid. Do you use a small crock pot for your steel cut oats? My crock pot is large, so I've not used it for breakfast porridge (even though that is usually my favorite breakfast). I'm so glad that Peckish Sister brought you into the cookbooker family.

Queezle, Do you know that you can just put a smaller container like a casserole dish inside your crockpot when you want to cook less of something?

No - but that makes sense! Do you add water outside of the smaller dish?

No need for water. Just find a smaller oven proof dish that fits inside your crock and cook inside that.

What a great concept! I'll give it a go -- there are several slow-cooker porridge recipes that have been calling my name... thanks, Beth.

I saw the casserole-in-the-crockpot trick illustrated on a website, but haven't tried it since we have a relatively small slow cooker. We did make the entire Alton Brown recipe, even though we knew we'd have leftovers, since it seemed important to have a certain minimum volume in the container. I was surprised at how good the leftovers were. I reheated portions in the microwave on the two mornings following the initial prep, and it was still excellent. Thanks for the welcome! I'm really enjoying Cookbooker so far. I've moved so many times in the last 15 years, that I ended up purging the vast majority of my cookbooks (and other books too) so as not to have to continue moving them. I'm feeling my first pangs of regret for that now, so I guess it's time to start the re-acquisition process!

Hi all, I did try the bowl-within-a-crock pot suggested by Beth. I prepared a millet porridge using a bowl within my crock pot, but I put water in the bigger crock. I figure its a better heat conductor than air, and my manual cautioned me against heating it empty. It worked well! Thanks all of you!

Glad that the trick worked for you! I've never tried it myself as I'm generally cooking for a large crowd but I had heard about it and it sounded perfect for what you needed.