I love my crock pot with all my heart, but so help me I hate to clean it. It is like the universe is making me pay back all the time I saved by using it in the first place. And then they invented those black slow cookers. Whose brain child was that? Those things show every single, miniscule piece of food or scum still left on them. Why not make crock pots beige? That way we could all at least live in a blissful oblivion of what was still stuck on there.

I have always wondered how do I get that scummy residue off my crock pot.

And then I discovered that there was a way to make your slow cooker as easy to clean as it was to cook in. Hallelujah! And your crock pot will actually be cleaner than if you had spent hours scrubbing it by hand. I can’t believe that after a decade of using my crock pot on a weekly basis I am only now figuring this out. It is a total game changer.

How to Clean Crock Pots the Easy Way

1. Remove the crock pot from its base.
2. Rinse out your crock pot to get all the non crusty food out of there. You don’t have to scrub anything, but I have found that it helps to get most of it out. I have tried it a couple of times without rinsing it at all and it stills works, just not as well.
3. Squirt some dish soap into the bottom of your crock pot and add a bit of vinegar.
4. Fill your crock pot with water up past the crusty line that is left by the food. Yuck…you totally know that nasty line I am talking about.
5. Place the crock pot back in its base and let the water “cook” on high for about an hour or two. Between the water and the heat, the food softens and comes right off. It is a lot like boiling water in your microwave before you clean it.
6. Turn off your crock pot and let the water cool until you can put your hand in without burning yourself. But don’t let it cool all the way or it won’t work as well.
7. Using a dish cloth (or I like to use old dryer sheets, they make great scrubbers you can just toss), rub around the inside of the crock pot to loosen any food.You don’t need to scrub, just rub it off.
8. Rinse out the crock pot with hot water and let dry. Never rinse a hot crock pot with cold water. The change in temperature can cause it to crack.

I am amazed at how clean my crock pot gets when I clean it this way and it is so easy. It is like it has a self-clean feature.