Posts
Yesterday, I got in touch with my inner Pioneer Woman (someone once compared my writing style to hers. WOW!!! Thanks!) and made homemade -- from scratch -- chicken stock! Yes, I did! You know what? It's EASY!!! It's cheap. Way cheaper than the box stock at the store! When the chicken stock was done, I moved on to dinner -- using the poached chicken from the stock to make a lovely Italian soup.
Ready?
Homemade Chicken Stock Recipe (sorry, no pictures. I wasn't thinking.)
Clean and toss the following into a stock pot:
- 4 ribs of celery, cut to four inch lengths
- 4 carrots, cut to four inch lengths
- 1 medium onion, chunked (I cut mine into eighths and separated the pieces
- 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
- 10 peppercorns
- Thyme (I used one tablespoon of dried thyme, though I would have preferred sprigs of fresh thyme)
- 3 bay leaves
- 2 large (or 4 small) chicken breasts with skin and bones
- 4 chicken thighs, with skin and bones
Cover the whole mess with cold water. Place it on stove and bring to a boil. Allow it to boil about 20 minutes. I didn't let it come to a rolling boil, but made sure it bubbled well. Then, reduce it to a simmer and allow it to cook another 40 minutes.
Remove chicken to a bowl and let it cool.
Pour the liquid from the pot, through a strainer into a smaller pot. Add salt to taste -- I used sea salt, only about 1/2 tsp. (You can always add more salt to individual recipes. You can't remove it once it's there though.) Toss all the veggies and stuff into the garbage. They're all used up. (I tasted. Yuck.) Put the smaller pot of chicken broth on the stove and bring it to a boil. Allow it to simmer hard -- a little boil, but not quite rolling boil -- for at least 30 minutes. Then lower it to a simmer. The water will simmer off and the chicken stock will continue to reduce as long as you want. I simmered mine for about 2 hours.
That's it!!!!
Store the stock in sealed containers in the fridge for up to five days. You can freeze it for three months. (HINT: Put a piece of scotch tape on the lid and write the date you made it with a sharpie. You'll never wonder how old something is ever again.) Also, once it gets cold, you can skim the fat off the top to make it healthier! YAY!!! (After all, it's almost swim season :D)
Tomorrow, I will post the soup recipe. YUM! If you plan to make it, you will need three cups of the chicken stock and all that chicken, deboned, skin removed, cut into bite size chunks. Easy!
The Proverbs 31 woman expands her husband's empire. She is frugal and wise. My husband doesn't have an empire, but I still like to maximize his income. It's my honor to serve my husband this way!
WHEN you make your own stock (I didn't say IF, I said when), please let me know how it turns out!
Blessings,
10 comments:
Awesome reference to the Proverbs 31 woman!!! It is so encouraging to read about other women who want to serve and honor their husbands! www.questofthenocturnalbaker.blogspot.com
Love making my own stock when I have the time, but I never add vegetables. Should definitely do that next time! Have a great Tuesday and thanks for sharing.
It is easy and SO much better than store bought!
I use a similar recipe and make it weekly...freezing for future use.
Thanks for sharing ~ stopping in to visit from VoiceBoks.
Thanks for the recipe! We make our own chicken stock, but it's always great to try new ones.
I was JUST reading about homemade chicken stock and the health benefits of using thighs and then BOOM here is your post. I love when that happens. Thanks for the great recipe!!
By the way, get started!!! http://www.mental-chew.com/2012/02/garden-you-can-grow-herbs.html
I'm almost amazed whenever I do something in the kitchen how nice it actually is to be domestic.
I LOVE homemade stock! Just a hint so that you don't have to feel like your are wasting vegetables--we place veggie "scraps" (carrot, peels, ends of onions, ends of celery pieces, etc) into a bag in the freezer every time we make some with fresh vegetables. Pretty soon you'll have a full bag that you can use in your stock. You get all the great flavor of the vegetables, since you just end up straining and discarding the veggies anyway. Try it and let me know what you think!
You must have left Ohio before I taught you to make chicken stock! An aside here, IMO, bone-in chicken is much more tender and flavorful than boneless. So for tacos, casseroles, chicken salad, whatever, I like to simmer bone-in chicken. The stock is a bonus.
Hmmmm...there's nothing like homemade chicken soup! I have to run this recipe by my gramma!
Post a Comment