My Fast Lane to Flavor

Slow cookers serve up delicious dishes for every season and skill level

By DONNA PIERCE

Last week, a digital headline reminded me about my enthusiasm for a kitchen appliance I’ve come to treasure. The headline? “Autumn Marks the Beginning of Slow Cooker Season.”

“Wrong,” I answered my computer screen, quickly linking back to a June newsletter when I included slow cookers among my “cool tools” keeping summer kitchens cool with “delicious everyday dishes and celebration feasts.”

This seasoned cook first began writing about slow cookers years ago in a story grouping culinary trends by decade. At that time I included slow cookers among 1970s appliance introductions and kitchen trends.

Ebony Test kitchen photo from Johnson Publishing Company Archives. Courtesy J. Paul Getty Trust and Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Culinary artifacts from the 1980s included electric woks, pasta machines, yogurt makers and tabletop ice cream machines. I included salad spinners, electric hot dog cookers, buffet warming trays, electric knives, an…