During testing, I carefully rated it on its features, ease of use and cleaning, design, value for money, and those all-important results, evaluating how it performed in a real-life kitchen setting in comparison to other slow cooker models I've recently tested. About the author Slow cookers range in capacity, from a compact 1.5 litres up to 7 litres. As a general guide, a 1.5 to 2.3-litre capacity is great for two people, a larger 4 to 4.5 litres will feed four, and 5.5 to 7 litres is ideal for four to six people.

The Tower Cavaletto earned a place on our best slow cooker round-up thanks to its style, ease of use, and tasty results. It's a fairly basic model, which is reflected in the price tag, but if you're looking for a gadget that gets the job done well with the added bonus of looking elegant on your countertop, then the Cavaletto could be the one for you. The controls tend to be similar on most slow cookers with a ‘low’ setting for longer, slower cooking throughout the day and a ‘high’ setting for faster cooking with similar slow-cooked results. A one stop pot for cooking all of your curries, soups, stews and casseroles, this stainless steel Tower manual slow cooker makes preparing family meals hassle-free. Does your slow cooker have good heat distribution? Some can suffer from hot spots that cause drying out in corners or at the base. Uneven heat is something that’s more likely to occur in larger bowls. This function starts your cooking off on a high setting before automatically reducing the temperature to the low setting for the remainder of the cooking time.Slow cookers range in size from a compact 1.5 litres to a 6.5-litre bowl, so be sure to choose the right size for the way you intend to cook. As a rough guide, 1.5-3 litres will feed one or two people, 3-5 litres, three or four people and anything over five litres should suit a large family, with six litres or more ideal for batch cooks who like to fill the freezer. Alternatively, a larger cooker is great for those who like to eat what’s leftover for lunch the next day. The Tower's inner pot is dishwasher safe for easy clean up. However, I opted to wash the pot by hand so it didn't take up too much dishwasher space. With Fairy washing up liquid and a soft sponge, both the lid and pot were super easy to clean; I was particularly impressed with how simple it was to remove food residue from the pot – it took less than a minute and needed very little elbow grease. I tested the Tower Cavaletto at home in my north London kitchen, using it to make a hearty beef casserole so I could assess how it handled veggies, meat, and sauce. The Russell Hobbs Good to Go Multicooker is a true multi-tasker. Armed with a variety of capabilities, you can make sure that your meat is cooked just right before you cut it open, or fill up a water bath for succulent sous vide fish or veggies. This digital slow cooker comes with a removable control dial on its front control panel, which has pre-set modes for steaming and stewing as well as high and low manual temperature levels. There is also a keep warm mode.

Related: The best food processor for blending, chopping and dicing Cooking in the Tower 3.5L Cavaletto Slow Cooker: how easy is it to use? This Tower Cavaletto 3.5 litre slow cooker is a great and cost-effective way to make deliciously healthy meals for all the family. There are three different heat settings to choose from - low, high and keep warm - so you can cook a range of dishes, including casseroles, soups, stews, curries and even bread, all ready when you get home in the evening. This slow cooker features a large 3.5 litre capacity, letting you serve to 4-5 people, making it perfect for wholesome family mealtimes. You can activate a keep warm setting to keep your food ready for as long as six hours after your cooking mode has finished. The sear mode took only a few minutes to pre-heat and we were able to brown our onions before adding curry ingredients, which delivered a lot of extra flavour.The slow cooker's 'reduce' function was useful for bubbling away excess liquid after slow cooking. Some things can deter us all from cooking. Having to transfer food from a pan to a pot, cleaning up or that annoying puddle of water you get from putting the lid down on the worktop when it comes to the best slow cookers. If that's you, you need this model, which can act as a cooker and a serving pot that you can plonk down straight on the dining table. Slow cookers are also brilliant for less-than-confident cooks, easily creating all those meals that seem a bit scary on the hob. That’s because slow cooking develops the flavours of food for richer, tastier results. It’s not just dinners that slow cookers excel at making either. They make great porridge, granola, stewed apples, bread and butter pudding, fudge and dips. You can use your slow cooker to melt chocolate, as a Bain-marie. How much should I spend on a slow cooker?

How easy is the Tower 3.5L Cavaletto Slow Cooker to clean?

Litre Stainless Steel Slow Cooker Beautifully tender meats and casseroles are easily achieved with this slow cooker Most slow cookers will have similar standard controls – high heat for meals cooked in less than a few hours, low heat for all-day cooking. A 'keep warm' mode should hold food at a serveable temperature without actually cooking it. Some cookers will switch to 'keep warm' automatically after an elapsed cooking time, while more basic models need this altered manually. By sealing food in pouches, the juices and subtle flavours that could otherwise be lost during conventional cooking are retained.