The greatest plus to a crock pot is place all items into the crock pot, turn it on and leave until ready to serve. This crock pot is great for appearance, size and easy clean up. Recently some one gave me deer meat and the best thing I could say about the deer meat was the dear was in the woods of many years. It was beyond tought. I cut the meat and put into the crock pot with some seasoning and a few hours latter we had a wonderful meal. This is my third crock pot, sadly I was not able to find a crock pot with a medium setting.