Thermal Cooker Recipes

Your Source for Thermal Cooker Recipes and Information

Heather Clark

Thermal Cooker White Chicken Chili – A Slow-Cooked Family Favorite

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Before I tell you that this Chicken Chili will change your cooking life, I almost feel like we need to start having verbage at the start of these posts that’s standard, and that informs you that this recipe will seem abnormally simple. Because . . . thermal cooking, people. Thermal. Cooking! It’s all simple

No, it’s not your go-to if it’s five pm and you forgot to cook dinner. It’s a slow-cooking method, which means you need time.

But not time that you personally have to spend. And not a clock that you have to watch, stressed out that you’ll mess up the timing. You will not mess up the timing. You will remember in 2-8 hours that your dinner is cooking, and you will be hungry, and you will open your thermal cooker, and you will be ready to eat your perfectly cooked meal.

And in the case of this, and many other recipes, you will have spent approximately ten minutes in the morning throwing things in a pot, five minutes boiling said “things,” and the whole day knowing that dinner is happily cooking in your thermal cooker on your counter or in your van or in your campsite.

This particular recipe is a family favorite from FOREVER ago. Kate first cooked it for me the week I came home from the hospital with my now-twelve-year-old daughter. All of our extended family makes this one over and over. It wins cookoffs. It wins hearts. It wins more a certain would-be president.

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This recipe is modified from The Low-Fat Living Cookbook by Leslie L. Cooper.

Basically, once again, the chicken chili recipe instructions call for you to throw all ingredients in a pot. (with the exception of the cornstarch)

Bring the mix to a rolling boil for 3-5 minutes, or whatever your personal thermal cooker recommends. Then remove some broth, and mix with cornstarch, then return to pot, and boil for one minute to thicken.

Put the lid on, seal the unit, and cook for 3-8 hours. Then serve your hot and delicious chicken chili with shredded cheese, sour cream, and chips or tortilla strips. This meal is healthy and oh-so-flavorful. Enjoy!

Thermal Cooker White Chicken Chili – A Slow-Cooked Family Favorite
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Ingredients

  • 2 T olive oil
  • 2 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, bite-sized
  • 1 large onion, finely chopped
  • 20 tomatillos, husked, washed, finely chopped
  • 2 small or 1 large jalapeno, seeded and finely chopped
  • 12 cloves minced garlic
  • 4 tsp chili powder
  • 2 tsp oregano
  • 2 tsp sugar
  • 1 tsp cumin
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 6 cups chicken or veggie broth
  • 4 cans drained pinto or black beans, or a mix.
  • 1 can corn kernels
  • 1 finely chopped bunch fresh cilantro
  • 2 T lime juice
  • 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
  • 2 T cornstarch

Instructions

Put all ingredients except cornstarch into large pot of thermal cooker and bring to a rolling boil for 3 minutes. Remove about 1/2 C of broth, mix together with cornstarch, and return to pot, boiling for 1 minute to thicken. Remove pot from heat, put on the lid, and seal it into the thermal cooker. Leave for 3-8 hours. Serve hot with tortilla chips or strips, shredded cheese, and sour cream.

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http://thermalcookerrecipes.com/thermal-cooker-white-chicken-chili/

Thermalcookerrecipes.com provides recipes as a resource and educational tool only, and makes no food safety guarantees. We are not liable for any failure to meet food safety standards that may arise in your thermal cooking. We make every effort to ensure that our recipes meet established food safety standards. But all thermal cookers are not created equal, and there are many variables at play resulting in the temperatures reached and maintained in your thermal cooker. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific brand and model of thermal cooker, even if that means tailoring our recipes.

If you are in doubt, please consult the FDA page on foodborne illness for safe cooking temperatures and other safety tips. And use a food thermometer to ensure that your food has been cooked and stored at a safe temperature.

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. This means, we may receive a small commission if you choose to purchase something from a link we post. Don’t worry, it costs you nothing. Thank you for supporting our website!

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Thermal Cooker Split Pea Soup—Hearty, Healthy Comfort Food in Ten Minutes Prep Time

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Seriously. It’ll take me longer to put up this post than it will take you to make dinner with this recipe. And when you read how not long this post is, you’ll know that’s saying something. And it’s healthy, hearty, delicious, and vegetarian. Unless you add chopped up ham (which I highly recommend you do.)

Add the ingredients to the large inner pot of your thermal cooker.

Stir, and bring to a three minute rolling boil.

Put the pot inside the thermal cooker, and put the lid on. Seal the unit.

Allow to cook for 3-8 hours, and then give your piping hot, perfect soup a stir with a whisk if you’d like it chunkier, or with a wand blender for a few seconds if thick and smooth is your favorite.

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Serve with hot, crusty bread, and everyone will know you for the domestic goddess you are. (Or whip this baby out at a pot luck or picnic with a couple of loaves of French bread you bought on the way. Still goddess-level powers.)

Enjoy this one. I can taste it already. Mmmmmm.

Thermal Cooker Split Pea Soup—Hearty, Healthy Comfort Food in Ten Minutes Prep Time
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Ingredients

  • 9 Cups broth (vegetable or chicken or stock from ham hock)
  • 3 Cups dried green split peas (rinse well first)
  • 1 large chopped onion
  • 2 C chopped carrots
  • 4 chopped celery stalks
  • 1/2 Tbsp minced garlic
  • 1 tsp dried basil
  • 1/2 tsp dried cumin
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp black pepper
  • 3 C small chopped new red potatoes with skins on

Instructions

Bring all ingredients to a 3 minute rolling boil in your inner pot. Place pot inside of thermal cooker, put on lid, seal unit. Cook for 3-8 hours, and when ready to serve, whisk soup to mix in split peas, or run a wand blender for a couple of bursts for a more uniform texture.

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http://thermalcookerrecipes.com/thermal-cooker-split-pea-soup-hearty-healthy-comfort-food-ten-minutes-prep-time/

Thermalcookerrecipes.com provides recipes as a resource and educational tool only, and makes no food safety guarantees. We are not liable for any failure to meet food safety standards that may arise in your thermal cooking. We make every effort to ensure that our recipes meet established food safety standards. But all thermal cookers are not created equal, and there are many variables at play resulting in the temperatures reached and maintained in your thermal cooker. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific brand and model of thermal cooker, even if that means tailoring our recipes.

If you are in doubt, please consult the FDA page on foodborne illness for safe cooking temperatures and other safety tips. And use a food thermometer to ensure that your food has been cooked and stored at a safe temperature.

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. This means, we may receive a small commission if you choose to purchase something from a link we post. Don’t worry, it costs you nothing. Thank you for supporting our website!

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Thermal Cooker Tomato Chicken Curry

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This recipe is a family favorite. I invented it a couple of years ago, and we have loved it in the pressure cooker and the slow cooker. It is a perfect recipe to transition over to the thermal cooker. You can click here to purchase your thermal cooker. And of course, thermal cooker curry is the perfect meal to take along on a potluck or soccer night. It’s warm and delicious, and can stay piping hot with its perfectly cooked rice, all in one pot. It definitely takes one-pot-cooking to a whole new level.

And as far as instructions? Well this one is really complicated—for a thermal cooker recipe. It involves exactly five simple steps.

  1. Cut the chicken into bite-sized pieces, dump all ingredients into the large nesting pot, except the tomato paste.
  2. Bring the whole pot to a rolling boil for 3 minutes (or however long your pot’s manufacturer’s instructions instruct) stirring frequently.
  3. Add in tomato paste, and bring back to boil for 1 minute, stirring constantly.
  4. Cook your rice in smaller nesting pot at same time.
  5. Put both pots into your thermal cooker, put the lid on, and seal. Leave for 3-8 hours, and then open for perfect dinner!

Thermal Cooker Tomato Chicken Curry
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Ingredients

  • 2.5 - 3 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, thawed and cut into bite-sized pieces
  • 1 14 oz can diced tomatoes
  • 1 C chopped onions
  • 2 T olive oil
  • 1/2 T finely shredded ginger
  • 1/2 T minced garlic
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 T Mae Ploy Yellow Curry Paste
  • 1/2 tsp cumin
  • 1/2 tsp paprika
  • 1 T lemon juice
  • 1/4 tsp red pepper (optional)
  • 1/8 tsp cloves
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 2-3 C water (just enough to cover mixture with liquid)
  • 1 can tomato paste

Instructions

Mix all ingredients, except for the tomato paste in large pot.

Bring to a rolling boil for 3 minutes, stirring frequently.

Add tomato paste, mix well, and return to rolling boil for 1 minute, stirring constantly.

Prepare rice at same time as boiling mixture. Put both pots directly into the thermal cooker, put on lid, seal, and open 3-8 hours later. (Always consult the manufacturer directions for your brand of thermal cooker for actual cooking times to ensure food is kept at a food safe temperature.

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http://thermalcookerrecipes.com/thermal-cooker-tomato-chicken-curry/

Thermalcookerrecipes.com provides recipes as a resource and educational tool only, and makes no food safety guarantees. We are not liable for any failure to meet food safety standards that may arise in your thermal cooking. We make every effort to ensure that our recipes meet established food safety standards. But all thermal cookers are not created equal, and there are many variables at play resulting in the temperatures reached and maintained in your thermal cooker. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific brand and model of thermal cooker, even if that means tailoring our recipes.

 

If you are in doubt, please consult the FDA page on foodborne illness for safe cooking temperatures and other safety tips. And use a food thermometer to ensure that your food has been cooked and stored at a safe temperature.

http://www.fda.gov/food/foodborneillnesscontaminants/buystoreservesafefood/ucm255180.htm

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. This means, we may receive a small commission if you choose to purchase something from a link we post. Don’t worry, it costs you nothing. Thank you for supporting our website!Thermal Cooker Curry - Pinterest

Thermal Cooker Bulgogi – Korean BBQ

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Thermal Cooker Bulgogi - Slider

My sister-in-law is from Korea. She cooks the best food ever. This thermal cooker bulgogi is not one of her recipes. 🙁

But it is DELICIOUS, and until she comes over from Korea again to cook me her homemade bulgogi, this will have to do. Also, in the thermal cooker, it was about a 10 minute total project, and it came out piping hot. The meat was all intact, but melt-in-your-mouth tender, and the rice was perfect. All this after seven hours cooking, and being transported to a Korean themed bachelorette party —don’t ask!

Thermal Cooker Bulgogi - Featured

The joy of this, like most of our recipes is that to cook it, you dump the ingredients into your large pot, boil hard for three minutes, and put it into the cooker to cook. This was a fun experiment, because I just let the rice go the whole time, hoping it wouldn’t overcook. It was absolutely delicious! Better for certain than 7 hours in the rice cooker on warm.

I felt like a cooking superstar, and it was easy as anything!

Thermal cooker bulgogi also freezes very well. And you will probably want to freeze it, because this recipe makes a lot. Air is your enemy, as it brings down your food temperatures too quickly, so I always cook in larger amounts, and freeze leftovers.

See Kathryn’s recipe for instructions on the rice that I cooked in the nesting upper pot.

Thermal Cooker Bulgogi – Korean BBQ
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Ingredients

  • 1 C soy sauce
  • 1/2 C white sugar
  • 1 C chopped green onion
  • 1/3 C minced garlic
  • 1/2 C sesame seeds
  • 1/2 C sesame oil
  • 2 tsp ground black pepper
  • Water until beef is just covered (1-2 C)
  • 3 inch piece puréed fresh ginger
  • 4 pounds thin-sliced beef roast

Instructions

Purée fresh ginger in soy sauce and sesame oil and garlic, Add all ingredients to thin-sliced beef in large inner pot of thermal cooker. Add enough water to cover beef. Bring to a hard boil for at least 3-5 minutes, stirring consistently.

Place pot into thermal cooker, add nesting pot with prepared white rice. Seal, and cook for a minimum of 6 and a maximum of 8 hours.

Serve bulgogi over rice with steamed broccoli or other side vegetables.

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http://thermalcookerrecipes.com/thermal-cooker-bulgogi-korean-bbq/

**This post contains affiliate links**

Thermal Cooker Bulgogi - Pinterest

Thermalcookerrecipes.com provides recipes as a resource and educational tool only, and makes no food safety guarantees. We are not liable for any failure to meet food safety standards that may arise in your thermal cooking. We make every effort to ensure that our recipes meet established food safety standards. But all thermal cookers are not created equal, and there are many variables at play resulting in the temperatures reached and maintained in your thermal cooker. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific brand and model of thermal cooker, even if that means tailoring our recipes.

 

If you are in doubt, please consult the FDA page on foodborne illness for safe cooking temperatures and other safety tips. And use a food thermometer to ensure that your food has been cooked and stored at a safe temperature.

http://www.fda.gov/food/foodborneillnesscontaminants/buystoreservesafefood/ucm255180.htm

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. This means, we may receive a small commission if you choose to purchase something from a link we post. Don’t worry, it costs you nothing. Thank you for supporting our website!

Top 10 Reasons A Thermal Cooker Will Change Your Life

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Thermal Cookers are AMAZING. This is the post where I tell you the things that have my friends rushing out to buy a thermal cooker after water aerobics or a park play date.

You see, I can’t shut up about my thermal cooker, because it’s my favorite thing to happen to cooking since the electric pressure cooker. (And yes, I’m still using that also. They work really well in tandem, and the electric pressure cooker has lightning speed on its side. But now in no particular order, I give you the top ten reasons why owning a thermal cooker will change your life!

1. Convenient Hot Meals On The Go

I can’t overemphasize this–This pot is like your slow cooker except it doesn’t overcook, it doesn’t need a power connection, it doesn’t slop over the sides because the unit is sealed. This beautiful piece of engineering makes dinner something you can take anywhere, hot, ready, at a moment’s notice. Oops, Mom, I forgot to tell you I’ve got a game across town? Someone grab the picnic bag and the thermal cooker full of dinner. It’s cool to the touch on the outside, and it’s not going to spill all over our car. In a few minutes, wherever we go, we’ve got our healthy, hot dinner ready. And look… I’ve just become a domestic goddess!

2. Reduced Fuel Consumption = Saving the Planet and Your Budget

If it only takes a 3-5 minute rolling boil (recommended by my thermal cooker manufacturer–consult yours for requirements as each unit is different) to provide enough heat to cook your meal all day and keep it hot for up to 8 hours, think of all the energy you’ll save. Maybe you’re happy about this because you care about global warming and reducing your carbon footprint. Maybe you want to save on your power and gas bills. Maybe you’re just glad not to heat your kitchen up and melt off all your makeup. 😉 Maybe it’s the apocalypse, and you don’t have much in the way of fuel. This way you’re cooking your food well with a minimal time and fuel output.

3. Camping and Road Trips

If you’re like me, most times you go camping the food is the biggest part of the ordeal. What if you only needed enough fuel for your camp stove to do a 3 minute boil of your dinner? What if you could just dump canned goods into the thermal cooker, bring it to a boil, close the lid, and head off on your adventures for the day. When you stagger back into camp after your husband pushed you up a mountain all day–not speaking from personal experience here–what if a hot beef stew was waiting in your thermal cooker with fresh-baked cornbread in the top nesting pot?

Happier already? Me too! Also think about the morning you leave for your camping trip, taking 3 minutes to boil the pot you prepared the night before. Then you nestle your thermal cooker in the back of the van between sleeping bags and pads, and when you finish setting up camp, your chicken curry and rice are perfectly ready for dinner. Camping and traveling have never been SO delicious!

Traveling with another family? No problem. This cooker fed two families of five with leftovers every night. Providing food for extended family? Also no problem. That’s why you have two thermal cookers. 😉

4. Soccer Night

Don’t look now, but with 5-10 minutes of morning prep, you’re ready to win soccer night EVERY week! The other moms are whipping out their rubbery takeout pizzas, and you’re like… hold on kids, here’s the sloppy joes I just threw together this morning. Careful, now… don’t burn your mouth. It’s piping hot! Ever wanted everyone to hate you? Oh, and then when it’s your turn to provide the game-end treats, you’re like, hold on… let me open up my second thermal cooker that’s stuffed full of ice cream sandwiches that I threw in three hours ago, and still have the frost on the outside of the papers! Don’t believe me? Get ready to have your mind blown.

5. Perfectly Cooked Meals — Ready When You Are

Ever left your slow-cooker on too long? Oh no… Look at all that crusty residue burnt all over the sides of the pan. That’s going to be a bear to clean, and not very delicious. And those potatoes and zucchini chunks? Boiled to bits of goo. But not anymore. No crusty, baked on residue, because the heat source for your food is the food itself. Nothing is jostling or boiling the food. Potatoes stay pristine and shaped perfectly, even the zucchini in my veggie stew was the perfect consistency, and I let that baby cook for 6-7 hours. Most meals can be ready in 2-4 hours, but can stay hot and ready for up to 8. And there’s no fire risk like you have with a slow cooker.

6. Overnight Hot Breakfasts — Ready When You Wake

Wait until you try our amazing overnight steel cut oats! Perfect texture, and piping hot right when you wake up! Cooking breakfast in three minutes the night before? Yes, please.

7. A Portable Fridge – Cold Foods On The Go

With a pre-chilled inner pot and ice in the top nesting pot, you’re that person who can bring ice-cold popsicles to the beach, and eat them four hours later. Yes, you shall be the star of every outing. Also, think about your cold foods kept nice and cold all day on the road trip. No more lukewarm, floppy string cheese. 🙂

8. Ten Minute Meal Prep

Early in the morning, when you have a few free minutes, throw together dinner for that night. The kitchen hasn’t had a chance to heat up yet, and you’re not going to heat it up. You’re just going to mix a bit, boil for a minute or two, and close the thermal cooker. Then all day, your dinner is happily cooking without heating up the kitchen, without sucking power, and without filling your house with food smells. I know the smell of cooking dinner is sometimes pleasant. But not after the cooking is done, and the strange meaty garlic smell is lurking in the bedroom for several hours. Also not when what you’re cooking is dry beans. Imagine well-cooked beans without the bean stench filling the house.

9. Pot Luck Perfection

Just imagine being the one person at the pot luck who isn’t looking for a plug in, who doesn’t have to reheat the food they brought, who doesn’t need to quickly shove their cold salad into the refrigerator, taking up prime fridge real estate. You’re the one who’s like . . . oh . . . it’s time to eat? Sure, let’s just open up my thermal cooker, and pull out the perfect meal as though I timed it for this very minute.

10. No More 5 PM What’s For Dinner — Healthier Dinner Ready To Go

The bonus of cooking your food in five minutes in the morning, and then forgetting about it all day, is that when you’re suddenly realizing it’s five o’clock, and you’re having that heart attack, wondering if you should run to Little Caesar’s, you will realize that your hot, perfect, healthy meal is sitting waiting for your family. And this cooking method preserves nutrients, and will often mean a home-cooked meal when you might have reached for the box of mac and cheese instead.

If I haven’t convinced you yet, I’m not sure I ever will . . . but Kate couldn’t convince me until I saw it for myself. I’ll be posting more YouTube videos in the coming days, so hopefully it’ll feel like you’re there, experiencing it with me.

If I have convinced you, click here to buy your Saratoga Jacks Thermal Cooker today!

This post contains affiliate links.

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Thermalcookerrecipes.com provides recipes as a resource and educational tool only, and makes no food safety guarantees. We are not liable for any failure to meet food safety standards that may arise in your thermal cooking. We make every effort to ensure that our recipes meet established food safety standards. But all thermal cookers are not created equal, and there are many variables at play resulting in the temperatures reached and maintained in your thermal cooker. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific brand and model of thermal cooker, even if that means tailoring our recipes.

 

If you are in doubt, please consult the FDA page on foodborne illness for safe cooking temperatures and other safety tips. And use a food thermometer to ensure that your food has been cooked and stored at a safe temperature.

http://www.fda.gov/food/foodborneillnesscontaminants/buystoreservesafefood/ucm255180.htm

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. This means, we may receive a small commission if you choose to purchase something from a link we post. Don’t worry, it costs you nothing. Thank you for supporting our website!

The Portable, Cordless Slow-Cooker

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Before my sister Kate came to visit this summer, she kept going on and on about her new hot pot, thermal cooker thingy. And wasn’t I so excited? And what meals were we going to make with it to serve everyone on our camping trip?

Um… none. Because the pot sounded weird. And I don’t need one more new contraption in my life.

But then she arrived, and cooked her first meal with the wondrous thermal cooker.

And then I didn’t stop cooking for both families with the blasted pot every day until she left to go home. I ordered my own before I even let her drive away. You can watch my Unboxing of my Saratoga Jacks Thermal Cooker on our YouTube channel. I’m almost spastic with excitement!

The thermal cooker is essentially a slow-cooker . . . that cooks your food without attached power!

It has two sizes of pots that basically nest in a giant thermos, permitting you to cook two different dishes at once, using nothing but the heat of your initial rolling boil from your stove top, and the vacuum insulation power of the giant thermos to retain all that heat, cooking vegetables, sauces, meats, grains, and much more to perfection!

And did I mention that after those first few minutes to boil the raw ingredients, you place the hot pot into the thermos (which remains cool to the touch on the outside), seal it up, and it maintains food at a hot temperature for up to 8 hours if you follow the manufacturer’s directions?

Did I mention that the veggies stay intact, not losing shape or burning, because only the trapped heat does the cooking, so there’s far less chance of overcooking food, and I’ve never seen meat cooked to such perfect, fall-apart deliciousness.

No cords, no power suck, no electricity requirements. No tether keeping it in one spot.

I won’t go off now about all the AMAZING uses for this amazing pot, but just imagine the possibilities with me . . .

Or go here to buy your Saratoga Jacks Thermal Cooker today!

Portable, Cordless

 

Thermalcookerrecipes.com provides recipes as a resource and educational tool only, and makes no food safety guarantees. We are not liable for any failure to meet food safety standards that may arise in your thermal cooking. We make every effort to ensure that our recipes meet established food safety standards. But all thermal cookers are not created equal, and there are many variables at play resulting in the temperatures reached and maintained in your thermal cooker. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions for your specific brand and model of thermal cooker, even if that means tailoring our recipes.

 

If you are in doubt, please consult the FDA page on foodborne illness for safe cooking temperatures and other safety tips. And use a food thermometer to ensure that your food has been cooked and stored at a safe temperature.

http://www.fda.gov/food/foodborneillnesscontaminants/buystoreservesafefood/ucm255180.htm

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. This means, we may receive a small commission if you choose to purchase something from a link we post. Don’t worry, it costs you nothing. Thank you for supporting our website!