We worked hard to pack our stews with interesting combinations of vegetables, so naturally we also focused a lot of attention on ensuring that they were perfectly cooked. For stews that had a short stay in the slow cooker, sturdier vegetables like potatoes and carrots, depending on how large they were cut, just could not cook through properly. In these instances, we parcooked them before adding them to the slow cooker. For longer-cooking stews, the opposite was often the case, with vegetables turning mushy, colorless, and flavorless. In these instances, we often needed to slow down their cooking by insulating them in a foil packet and placing it on top of the stew.

Meat stews are traditionally heavy on the meat and light on the vegetables. In order to create healthier stews, we limited the amount of meat to 4 ounces (once trimmed) per person and added plenty of extra vegetables—this kept portion sizes ample but trimmed fat and calories substantially.

Over the years, we’ve learned that the microwave is a great ally when creating slow-cooker recipes. In many (but not all) recipes it can eliminate the need to get out a skillet, especially if you are just softening aromatics and blooming spices. As an added benefit, this method usually requires less fat—just a teaspoon or two of oil. In our recipes, when we add delicate fresh vegetables at the end of a long cooking time, we often simply “steam” them in the microwave with a little water before adding them to the slow cooker. This helps the vegetables cook without any loss of flavor and ensures that they remain bright and crisp-tender.

The moist heat environment and long cooking times that come with the slow cooker are notorious for muting flavors, so many stews need a flavor boost before serving. you’ll see that we often finish our stews (and other dishes) with fresh herbs, citrus juice, vinegar, or other flavorful ingredients, like brown sugar and coconut milk.

Since there is no opportunity for stews to reduce and thicken naturally in the moist environment of the slow cooker, thickeners are often necessary. Classic fat- and flour-based roux add unwanted work (and fat) because they require extra stovetop cooking to remove the raw flour taste. So when possible, we try to use ingredients already in the stew to help thicken it. We have found success processing portions of canned beans and frozen corn before building the stew base, or finishing a stew by mashing some of the cooked beans and vegetables. If all else fails, we typically grab instant tapioca, which we have found over the years to be a great no-fuss thickener that can be stirred in at the start.