Good morning! My name Stephanie O'Dea and I love my slow cooker. Actually, I love all eight of them—and while I type, I've got two bubbling away on the countertop.

I first fell in love with my slow cooker at age twenty-one. I was newly engaged and thought it was about time I learned how to be “domestic.” I brought home a pasta machine, food dehydrator, and Crock-Pot slow cooker. Determined to become the next Martha Stewart, I spread out the instruction manuals on the kitchen table and got out my highlighter.

After sampling the squishy pasta and shriveled fruit the first two machines produced, they were shoved to the back of the pantry cabinet. But the blue floral slow cooker? That thing rocked.

I quickly figured out that I could make real food, food my family would actually eat with very little invested time and effort. I was hooked.

I fell in love with my slow cooker all over again when I had children. I found that it was just not safe to chop vegetables with cranky kids hanging off my ankles during the evening “witching hours.” I liked that I could throw together our evening meal early in the day while still heavily caffeinated and then leave the house to run errands or head to work. I now have three children, ages 8, 5, and 8 months. I had the misconception that once the kids were in school full-time my days would ease up a bit. Instead, I find the afternoon hours even more hectic—we’ve got homework, sports, Girl Scouts, and nighttime school events such as PTA. Although I try my hardest to limit outside activities, there are days when I feel like we are bouncing around all over the place. If I didn’t have a slow cooker plugged in, we’d eat fast food. Often.

I’m not a purist---I don’t have a problem with eating fast food or picking up a rotisserie chicken from the supermarket for dinner (I actually really like them), but I can’t justify the expense to our family budget or to our health by making a drive-through dinner the norm.

Our family has allergies. We stay away from gluten, and I prepare all of our meals completely gluten free. If you are not gluten free, simply ignore my notes or file them away in case you ever need to cook for someone with a gluten intolerance. It was a shock when I first learned that our family would need to eat gluten free, and I’d need to prepare most of our food from scratch. There is no easier way to cook from scratch than with the slow cooker.

In 2008 I decided to make a New Year’s Resolution to use my slow cooker every day for a year and write about it on the Internet. The result was an award-winning blog, appearances on The Rachael Ray Show, Good Morning America, and three books. My first cookbook, Make it Fast, Cook it Slow: The Big Book of Everyday Slow Cooking spent six weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers list. My second cookbook, More Make it Fast, Cook it Slow: 200 Brand New Recipes for Slow Cooker Meals on a Budget comes out at the end of the year. In the fall of 2011, I will release a housekeeping shortcut book for busy families (the name is still in the works!)

I am overjoyed to have been asked by Smithfield to write articles and post recipes. Before becoming pregnant with my third daughter I was allergic to pork. In fact, during my yearlong slow cooking challenge in 2008 I wrote a post called “Where’s the Pork?!” where I discussed my allergy and asked readers to write in their favorite pork recipes. When my chemical make-up got wonky during pregnancy and I started craving bacon (a lot. I’d go to the neighborhood pancake house and order 2 side orders and eat all the strips myself!) and realized I was no longer sensitive, I was thrilled to have so many great reader recipes to try.

Thank you for having me, and I look forward to sharing some great meal planning ideas and recipes with you!