I have a big pot and a teeny pot, and I most often use the teeny pot to make small cobblers or crumbles. Sweet stuff. Or, I might want to cook one vegetable a certain way, so I'll use it then. I've also used it to crock small bits of meat while I make vegetarian soup in the big pot. That way, I can have the extra protein I need, but I'm not making my veggie friends sick to their stomachs.

Speaking of potatoes, the tinypot would be good for doing baked potatoes. Wrap potato in foil. Place in pot. Low heat. No water. 8 hours later, perfect baked potato. My sister adores this so much, she makes several at a time in her big pot, but I've done 1 or 2 in the tinypot before.

It's not the size that matters, it's what you put into it that counts. :)

Are any of those recipes things that you could split in half? Homemade spaghetti sauce, for instance, can be made in just about any size crock pot, depending on the size of your family. You just adjust the recipe to fit. You could do a small pot roast with potatoes and carrots. Some people do crock pot cakes. A small pot of chili could be made in a 6 cup crock pot too. Smaller crock pots can be great for keeping beans hot and I bet you could do some soup for a cold day. A 1.5 quart should hold chicken and rice pretty nicely too.

Edited at 2011-11-21 10:25 pm (UTC)

I use my small crock for "baked" beans. Works perfectly for that.

I imagine you can also use it for fondues and hot dips.

I use my small crockpot for all kinds of things - soups, stews etc. I will often cut recipes down to what I want since I live alone.

I really just wing it. A lot of the time I just throw things together that I like to make soup or stews.

If I do use a recipe, I cut it in half (or whatever 2 servings work out to be) although I may use less meat and more veggies. Spices I adjust to my own taste.

Two suggestions:

1) Go to Amazon (or your local bookstore) and look for a book called Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Recipes for Two. It's perfect for this size of crock.

2) If you are really patient and feel like crawling through the archives for the last two years, look for my user name (ctrl-f and put rainbow_goddess in the search box), because I've shared some recipes from that book and one that I found in the library for small crocks of that size. If I have time later tonight, I'll see if I can find them later tonight. I'm on a break from work right now and have to go back in about two minutes, or I'd do it now.

I use mine for making oatmeal overnight.

1 cup Steel Cut Oats
4.5 cups water
Pinch of salt

Put on low overnight and breakfast is served in the morning.

A lot healthier than the processed or rolled oats and very satisfying on a cold, winter morning.

Meatloaf.

Two small "baked" potatoes.

Great for hot cheese dips.

One pound roast.

2-3 pieces of chicken.

Small thing of chili.

Pretty much anything in a large Crock, just make less and those are usually (look at the directions) on a low setting.

I still have the recipe booklet that came with my first "Crockette" which I think was 1.5 but could have been 1 quart. That was back in something like 1991 when I got my first little one.

I have a teensy one and a big mama one. I use the little one for small portions of chili, veg soup, roasts, baked beans (so good!) and for keeping food warm. Pretty much anything goes, in smaller portions.

I have a weensy one. One of my fave cold-weather things is a can of cheddar cheese soup, put in a small diced onion, a small cut up red potato, chop in some carrots and throw in ham cubes. Nom cheesy stew!

My partner and I are vegans so we eat lots of legumes. A small crock is really good for that if you're not cooking tons. Just add soaked beans (or soak them in the crock overnight) and add anything else that will fit (onion, garlic, spices, olive oil, etc). I leave my cooking all day. Just make sure to check that there's still liquid at all times.

The tiny ones are great for small batches of applesauce, beans, black-eyed peas, garbanzo beans for lunch salads, hot cereal (cooked overnight --- ready-made breakfast!), mulled wine, spiced cider... I also use mine to bake two or three potatoes, or to cook just a chicken breast or two, or for a kind of soup I like but my husband doesn't. (There are just two of us so anything one likes and the other doesn't gets made in small batches.)

You asked about how to cut down recipes. I do it a lot with some dishes. My rule of thumb for soaked dry beans is they should fill the crockpot about 2/3 full to leave room for expansion as they cook --- so I soak a quantity that will fill it about 1/3 or a little less full before soaking, since they tend to approximately double. Reduce the rest of the recipe proportionally; if you cut back the beans by half, cut back the rest of the ingredients by half, etc.

For soups, stews, applesauce, and hot drinks, I look at the total number of cups of ingredients it calls for and measure the total number of cups of water my crockpot will hold. Then I cut down the recipe proportionally. For pot roast, chicken breasts, etc, I see what the pot will reasonably hold. If my experience is anything to judge by (YMMV) you sort of develop a feel for it with experience --- or a rule of thumb, which may be even better than instinct.

Good luck and have fun!

I use my tiny crock to cook a small meal. Being Italian, I have the propensity to cook for at least a dozen people. Whatever vessel I use gets filled. I discovered that if I really try, I can scale down most anything to fit into the small crock, and we don't have to eat the leftovers for a week. Just cut it all by the same fraction (half, third, eyeballed) and it should work.

And you can always use it for rice or beverages, like hot cider or cocoa while you shovel snow.

http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2005/12/dips-fondue.html She's got some soup recipes just for the little dipper, too.

I use it for a recipe I got back in my college days (*cough* 1970s). Basically you combine 1 can of cream of chicken soup, 1 can of drained tuna and 1 can of peas (or double the entire thing) and then serve over noodles or rice or baked potatoes. Based on that I suspect there are all sorts of one dish/soup recipes that you could convert. With canned food like tuna (or pre-cooked food) you just run it until its simmered for a while.

Chocolate fondue (1/2 a bag of dark choco chips and 1 pint of heavy cream) leave on low, add 1/2 cup heavy cream (some grand marinier if you want) and stir occasionally to keep fluid..add heavy cream if it dries

Also, cheesy sauce. Dont have a recipe here, but I bet any standard cheesy sauce or cheesy dip recipe would work well here. You can also take it to work to heat up your soups and stews by lunch time.

As the others have said, you can scale down just about any recipe and it works okay, you just can't leave it for as long, and on as high a temperature. Recipes that call for 6 hours on high in a 5qt crock may need 5 hours on low in a 1.5 qt.

What I like to do is make huge batches of meat/vegetable soups - chili, meatless chili, beef stew, pork stew, chicken soup, etc. - and I freeze them in 1qt containers. I'll then defrost one container maybe two nights before I want to eat it, shove it in the crock in the morning, set in on low, and come back that evening to a nice warm meal, without all the chopping and whatnot in the morning :)

1 26 oz. can roasted garlic & onion spaghelli sauce
1 can mushrooms
3-4 skinless boneless chicken thighs

Serve over brown rice.

DIIIIIIP!!!! :D I'm a football junkie and my team is doing rather well so i've been dippin it out in my mini crock :P my most favorite recipe is:

1 lb of velveeta cubed and one can of hormel chili (any variety but i like the one without beans). toss in the cheese, top with the chili and let it cruise on high for about 1.5 hours. stir to combine when you think of it (after 45 minutes maybe) and when it's all bubbly and happily combined hit it with some chips!

i also like it for dinners when it's just me. i put one chicken breast in (frozen or fresh but a small fresh breast seems to sometimes fit better) add in one of the following:
BBQ sauce (shred chicken once it's out for sammies)
Salsa (shred for taco yummies or leave whole and serve over rice) *i love salsa verde with this*
marinade like lawry's brand (serve over rice)

cook on high for 4 hours (keep an eye on it, mine gets hot quickly and can scorch) or low for 8 and dig in! :D enjoy your mini crock!