The blues don’t come from how great the pot roast tastes after it simmers for eight hours in a slow cooker. The blues come from the fact that after several hours or so, the entire house smells like supper is ready. This turns into an afternoon of snacking to keep one’s hunger at bay. Then, when it’s really time to eat, you’re no longer hungry.

Our house smells great right now because I peeled carrots and potatoes and quartered onions at the crack of dawn. I added a bunch of secret herbs and spices. I won’t tell you what those are because if you try them and don’t like them, y’all might turn into an angry mob. One tip: the cup of Port wine is what makes it work so well, and that’s odd because I really don’t like Port.

The trick, I think, is to keep your afternoon snacks small–say, one Dorito or one Babybel® Cheese round out of the mesh bag or one chocolate chip cookie. Wash this down with about ten glasses of quality wine (preferably red though certainly not Port or bottom shelf Chianti).

We bought our first real Crock-Pot from Sunbeam (now Rival) in the 1970s when they were suddenly the best thing since fire. After a while, they became pas·sé, and those who still used them never told anybody since they’d be mocked as badly as those who admitted they were still drinking Mateus Rosé wine.

Now that their popularity has returned along with other time-saving devices aimed at families where both spouses have fulltime jobs, I can admit here in my blog that I’m making pot roast in a slow cooker (a real Crock-Pot, by the way).

Unfortunately, writing this post didn’t help with the hunger problem. Somewhere I read that every time you take off the lid to a Crock-Pot to check on what’s happening, you have to add 30 minutes to the cooking time. I have no idea whether that’s true, so I can even pretend to be tasting things (for quality control) the way I do when I make stew in the Dutch oven.

And it’s a bit early to be pouring a glass of wine.

–Malcolm

Malcolm R. Campbell’s novel Mountain Song is free on Kindle.