22THE ‘SLOW COOK’ SETTINGWARMING COMPARTMENTThe warming compartment is situated at the bottom right hand side of the cooker. Itcan be used for keeping plates or food warm. It is not designed as a ‘Slow Cook’ oven.With the fanned oven thermostat set to 90˚ the oven can be used for slow cooking - The‘Slow Cook’ setting.PREPARING FOOD FOR SLOW COOKING1. All dishes cooked by the ‘Slow Cook’ setting should be cooked for a minimum 6hours. They will ‘hold’ at this setting for a further hour but marked deterioration inappearance will be noticed in some cases.2. Joints of meat and poultry should be cooked at 170˚ for 30 minutes beforeturning to the ‘Slow Cook’ setting and never be cooked lower than the middle shelfposition.3. Joints of meat over 6 lbs (2.7kg) and poultry over 4 lbs 8oz (2 kg) should notbe cooked using the ‘Slow Cook’ setting.4. Always stand covered joints on a rack over the meat tin to allow good aircirculation.5. A meat thermometer should be used when cooking pork joints and poultry.The internal temperature of the food should reach at least 88˚C.6. This method is unsuitable for stuffed meat and stuffed poultry.7. Always bring soups, casseroles and liquids to the boil before putting in theoven.8. Cover casseroles with foil and then the lid to prevent loss of moisture.9. Always thaw frozen food completely before cooking.10. Root vegetables will cook better if cut into small pieces.11. Adjust seasonings and thickenings at the end of the cooking time.12. Use the zones of heat in the oven, e.g. meringues and milk puddings can becooked lower in the oven whilst other dishes requiring greater heat can becooked above them.13. Egg and fish dishes need only 1-5 hours cooking and should be included inday cooking sessions, when they can be observed from time to time.14. Dried red kidney beans must be boiled for a minimum of ten minutes aftersoaking, before inclusion in any dish.