Milo Ventimiglia Defends Crock-Pot's Innocence After Jack's Death on "This Is Us"
"I enjoy the heck out of a good slow cooker."
Warning: This article contains huge spoilers for last night's episode of This Is Us.
Milo Ventimiglia is helping to clean up Crock-Pot's reputation after This Is Us turned the slow cooker into America's most hated TV villain of 2018.
"Crock-Pot is innocent!" Ventimiglia told Esquire in an exclusive interview following the premiere of last night's "Super Bowl Sunday" episode.
On Sunday, This Is Us finally revealed that Ventimiglia's character, Jack Pearson, died from complications from smoke inhalation due to a fire caused by a faulty Crock-Pot. The appliance's malfunction is a detail that was teased in a previous episode.
Since then, Crock-Pot has launched a Twitter account to respond against the backlash the company has received for claiming the life one of the most beloved TV dads, and even created an ad starring Ventimiglia.
Ventimiglia told Esquire that he and his family still own and use a slow cooker (although it remains unplugged), and shared his favorite meal to make with it.
"I've got a really nice lentil stew that I like to cook in mine, and I have to be honest, I have two," he said. "I have a Crock-Pot, and I have an all-clad slow cooker — I have two different ones. The all-clad is larger, for maybe a gang of people, and my Crock-Pot's a little smaller if I'm just making something for myself. I have a slow-cooker cookbook — like, it's legit, it's no joke."
And although Ventimiglia seems to be doing a good amount of damage control, the actor does admit that at first he had a "weird" reaction to the appliance right after filming those dramatic This Is Us scenes.
"When I went to my mother and father's house for Christmas, I walk in the door and I go right into the kitchen, no one's around, and the first thing I see is a slow-cooker making chili," he shared. "And I had just filmed all of that! I was like, You gotta be kidding me. This is weird. I took a picture and sent it to my whole cast. So yes, I enjoy the heck out of a good slow cooker. Crock-Pot is innocent!"
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