When To Add Cooked Vs Dry Pasta To Slow Cooker Meals
If you're cooking a dish in your slow cooker that uses pasta, you'll want to pay attention to when to add your noodles. Add them too late, and you'll be chomping into hard pasta that isn't fully cooked — too early, and your pasta will be overcooked and potentially mushy.
You can't just follow the packet instructions when dealing with pasta in slow cookers because these appliances are, well, slow — and making your own slow cooker recipes typically requires some adaptation. In the case of pasta, the noodles go into a sauce or soup; the cooking process is closer to stewing or simmering, as opposed to the quick-boil method of throwing pasta into plain salted water on the stove.
If you don't want to worry about adjusting the timing, you can cook your pasta the regular way (in boiling water), drain it, and add it to the slow cooker right at the very end to mix it through the dish. This is a good idea when working with something that isn't too liquidy, like a thick Bolognese sauce versus a thinner soup or stew.
When to add dry pasta to slow cooker recipes
Adding dry (uncooked) pasta to a slow cooker is a bit more complicated in terms of the timing; you'll have to guess a little at the exact time it needs. Adding dried pasta no more than 45 minutes before you want to serve your food is a standard recommendation. However, the precise timing varies: Some sources and recipes suggest that 30 to 40 minutes is sufficient.
Even if you think your pasta needs 45 minutes to cook, it might be wise to check it at 30 minutes if you want that al dente bite to your noodles. You can try to figure out whether it will cook slower or faster based on the package instructions. For example, if the dried pasta has a quick cooking time in boiling water, it should cook faster in the slow cooker. The same should apply to longer cooking times.
As a general rule, the rest of your recipe should be cooked by the time you add the pasta. Dried pasta cooks best in the slow cooker when it's part of more liquid-heavy recipes, like soup — think minestrone or pasta fagioli.