Crockpot Dessert Recipes

Crockpot dessert recipes can free up your cooker for the main course. Practically anything that can be cooked in an oven or on your stove top can be made in a slow cooker.

Ramekins (small pottery dishes) can be used to cook individual servings for dishes such as baked custards.

Crockpot Dessert Recipes : Cakes

Cakes can either be baked directly in the crock, or in a flat bottomed cake tin which makes cleaning up easier. Ring tins with a central funnel help to distribute the heat evenly. It's easier to find cake tins to fit round slow cookers, and watertight tins are essential if cooking in a water bath.

Slow cookers are best suited to moist, fairly dense and rich cakes such as fruitcake. Sponges should be cooked at a high temperature for a short time and are better done in an oven.

Cupcakes can be made in a slow cooker, but only a few at a time. Again, the oven is best for these.

Cake Tips

Cover cake with a lid of kitchen towels which help to absorb excess moisture. Don't use a cake tin lid or foil which will keep the moisture in.

Lining the crockpot with foil or greased paper will make it easier to get the cake out in one piece.

Slightly raise the lid of the crock pot with a matchstick, cocktail stick or something similar. Again, this is to allow excess moisture to escape.

Start cakes off at the high setting for a couple of hours, then see how they are doing by pushing a skewer into the mix. If it comes out clean, the cake's cooked.

Crockpot Dessert Recipes : Puddings

Crockpot Rice Pudding

What could be simpler than a crockpot rice pudding? Crock pot rice pudding takes five minutes to prepare and has a much smoother texture than if cooked in an oven.

A slow cooker is absolutely ideal for making steamed puddings. The moist cooking environment is perfect.

Steamed sponges, baked custards, creme brulee, rice pudding, and bread and butter pudding all work very well indeed.

Pudding Tips

Avoid aluminium pudding bowls when cooking fruit because the acid in the fruit will react with the metal.

Crockpot Dessert Recipes : Cobblers and Crumbles

Cobblers and crumbles could not be easier in a slow cooker. Raw fruit, sugar and a little water are placed in the crock pot and cooked for two to three hours on high. Cobbler topping should be put on the fruit at the start because it needs the whole cooking time.

Crumble topping should be added for an hour after the fruit is cooked.

Canned fruit only has to be cooked for about an hour on high.

Crockpot Dessert Recipes : Cheesecake

Cheesecakes from a slow cooker have a lovely texture. They should be cooked in a separate tin on a trivet or upturned plate with a little water in the bottom of the cooker for about two hours.

Again, as with cakes, they should be covered with several paper towels to absorb excess moisture. Make sure the paper towels are supported so they can't contact the cheesecake.

Slow Cooker Tips

Fill cooker to at least half full, but not more than two thirds

Almost cover the ingredients with liquid for good transfer of heat

Lifting the lid during cooking will lose heat, increasing cooking time, and causing moisture loss

If using sugary ingredients, either use a liner or non-stick spray to make cleaning easier

Defrost ingredients before cooking

Place ingredients that are slower to cook, such as root vegetables, at the bottom of the cooker

Cooking on 'high' takes half as long as cooking on 'low'

If you had a power cut, there is no way of knowing if food is cooked properly. Throw it out

Don't re-heat food in a slow cooker

Cheaper, tougher cuts of meat will be tenderised in a slow cooker

Soak dried beans for twelve hours and boil for ten minutes before adding to the cooker to remove toxins

Adding a little liquid and pre-heating the cooker gives food a fast start