Pfmastin, below is the link to Amazon's page for Nesco's. Which one did you buy? I have a question. My old crockpot has the "circular" elements in it and it never browned chicken. How does the roaster brown meat when the condensation drips down on it from the lid? Although most of the reviews are good, many say it's too hot on the outside & you can burn yourself. How does that help keep the kitchen cooler? I'd love to bake a chicken in there and have it crisp up! And is the 6 qt. big enough for a large chicken?

I have an old Nesco Roaster I bought at a garage sale. It has the enamel porcelain and the inside is 11x15 inches. I think I could get a turkey in it. Do I have a 12 qt or an 18 qt? It doesn't say. Stamped on the bottom it says it was made in Granite City, Ill, and on the side is stamped the number 41E04044. The cord is rubber not braided. Any idea when it might have been made? It's white with a stainless top, bakelite handles, black porcelain, has a rack with sides you can lift and a little extra square tall pan with a lid for side vegetables, so I was told. Has the logo Nesco in script over a dial with numbers up to 400. I measured and I think I can even get my cast iron pan in there to bake cornbread. That's what I wanted it for, to bake. My regular oven is so big, why waste all that heat on that big space for a couple loaf pans. Can I use a silicone muffin pan in the Nesco or will it melt on the rack? Oh and I have seen people put water in the heatwell, under the cookwell, I was told it made for more even heating and to prevent damage to the enamel. But you don't want to do that, do you? If the water got through the heatwell seams it would get into the electrics.

Again, if you want dark brown, crispy skin you don't want to use a covered roaster, electric or non-electric. If you put a bird in a covered roaster in the oven it'll not be that mahogany color that some insist on. You need *dry* air to crisp the skin. Roasters keep the moisture in and it partly steams the food. I have the Roast-Air lid for my 6 qt and use it occasionally but I don't eat the skin anymore so I don't bother. I usually only used the lid the last 15-20 minutes, crank the heat up a bit too after I had removed all the juices. (Got to get rid of moisture to get dry, browning heat) You'll also have a lot more juice left in a roaster since it doesn't evaporate like in a dry oven. I've also cocked the lid to let the excess moisture out and cranked the heat up when I wanted it more crisp. Although even then I often microwaved the skin and ate it as a snack. I don't know what they do to the birds these days but I don't like the skin anymore. Even when it's dried out and crisper, I don't like the taste of it. Dry air is also going to give a bigger danger of dry meat. The appliance is a tool. The cook makes it good or bad. You can't always blame the tools when the carpenter is incompetent. FWIW I've never seen an electric roaster that didn't have a removable cookwell. Oh and removing the lid often loses a lot of heat and moisture. I highly recommend a probe thermometer that you can read outside of the oven or roaster. Yes the outside gets very hot. I've never burned myself but I've used some not-so-nice language when I've touched it. I've thought about wrapping it similar to a water heater blanket. Thought it might save some energy too. Target has an 18 qt Oster oven for $29, Menards has the 18 qt Nesco for $38.88 and Target has a Sunbeam 16 qt for $26. I imagine Target will put them on clearance before long too so if you want to wait you can pick up a bargain. Last year they had one on clearance for $17 (not a Nesco though). AFAIK, Nesco has never made a 16 qt unit. Nesco's have come in 4, 5, 6, 12 and 18 qt. If you measured water, it could be they consider the domed lid as part of the capacity, I'm not sure. Virginia Olson of Nesco always used to say that the 18 qt would handle up to a 20# bird, however, I read all the time about people doing 22# birds in the 18 qt. That sounds like about the max but many say if you can stuff it in there, it'll cook! And I'm sure it would. If anything you might have a crisper skin.

Years ago I did a family reunion cookout for 100. I did BBQ chicken. I bought whole chickens and broke them down into 10 pieces, leg, thigh, wing minus the tip, breast split 1/4's. I marinated the chicken in a salt and sugar brine with some garlic overnight then baked it in a 350 oven until cooked, cooled and froze it. Two days before the party the chicken was moved the the fridge to thaw. We set a 4' by 8' cooking pit about 12" deep, filled it with charcoal and topped it with a stainless steel screen. The chicken was reheated in two batches on the pit grill. We basted it with a thin BBQ sauce using a food mop. We made the sauce from scratch using ketchup, melted butter, garlic, liquid smoke, paprika, balsamic vinegar, worcestershire, hot sauce, dry mustard and black pepper. Don't ask me for a recipe for this, we winged it. I was lucky to remember to write down the ingredients. My cousins helped make the sauce and I believe there was a copious amount of spiritual fermenti involved. LOL The point is if you plan ahead, BBQ chicken for a crowd can be fairly easy. in our case, the pit itself was an attraction which kept me from being isolated from the party.