A Love Letter to my Slow Cooker

Have I yet waxed lyrical on here about my slow cooker?

If not, this is the last place I’m getting around to it. I fucking love my slow cooker. We’ve been together for over a year now, so I think I can safely say it’s love.

I don’t think I would have gotten as much use out of it before I had Little Z, but as a parent, the slow cooker is life changing. This is because I get home from work at about 5:45, and Little Z gets hungry for dinner around 6, maybe 6:10 on the outside. A few of those precious minutes go to things like taking off and putting away coats and boots, finding Z’s water bottle, and pouring me a glass of wine. This leaves somewhere between 10 and 20 minutes before dinner.

It is possible, if difficult, to cook a delicious and healthy meal in 10-20 minutes. I can do it. What I can’t do is cook a delicious and healthy meal in that amount of time while Z clings to my legs, howling and headbutting the place she came out of, which is what she will do if I try to cook for that long. She’s been at daycare all day, and while she loves her teachers and friends, when she gets home she wants some attention from mama or papa or, preferably, both.

If we’re both home, this is no problem, and one of us takes her to the living room to play while the other stays in the kitchen to cook. The living room and kitchen are actually one big room with a counter separating them, so the cooking parent still gets to chat with the rest of the family. It’s all very cozy.

But one or two days a week, Nick works late.

This is why there’s split pea soup in the slow cooker right now. Because Nick’s going to be home late tonight, and the slow cooker is my best chance of having a nice evening with my little girl. Not, mind you, that she’s likely to eat the soup, but I will. She’ll probably have cheesy toast and grapes and yogurt, and an untouched bowl of split pea soup. But you never know: she might take a bite. And I still need a good meal, whether or not she eats it. Plus I need a better lunch tomorrow than the cold grilled cheese I had today, quickly made this morning and shoved still hot into a plastic bag.

I love the slow cooker because I can put a big mess of something in there on Sunday at noon, when Z goes down for her nap, and have dinner ready for that night, plus leftovers for Monday’s lunch, plus more leftovers for a weeknight dinner. Awwww  yeah, my slow cooker has a big ol’ 6 qt. capacity.

I’ll let you know how the split pea soup comes out. If it’s good, you can even have the recipe.