Gary wrote:
>
> I always start a slow cooker (crockpot) on high up to a simmer. You don't
> want to put things in there at low temp and let bacteria grow for hours.
> That said, the simmer temps later on will kill off all of the bacteria.

Long ago I had a crockpot with an "automatic" setting. It cooked on
high until its thermostat reported that it had reached temperature then
switched to low. I don't know what the temperature was but it always
worked fine. I have not seen such a feature in years.