Chicken Stock
Brian On Thursday, August 12, 2010 at 11:59AM You know those cans or boxes of stock that you buy to make your soups, stews, and sauces taste better. Have you ever actually, you know, just taken a sip of what's in them? By and large, it's not a pleasant experience. Part of it is because, ideally, there's no salt in any of them, but most of them are overloaded with salt. Now, while I'm a big proponent of salt, I prefer to add my own and not to have the stock manufacturer add it for me.
So, if you wouldn't actually want to drink the stock that comes out of a can or a box because it tastes bad, why would you use it to enhance your soups, stews, and sauces? Ideally, you wouldn't. Sometime you do because of time constraints (I know I do), and sometimes you do it out of habit. It's time to break the habit.
To make a chicken stock, you need:
A chicken. This could be a whole chicken, as shown here, because I had no parts available and whole chickens are inexpensive. It could be chicken bones, it could be wings and thighs (bone in, for preference), it could be a collection of carcasses from previous roast chickens along with some necks that you thoughtfully saved for just such an occasion.
Aromatic vegetables. In this case, an onion, celery, and some leftover "baby" carrots from a party we had. They're not really baby, of course, they have just been turned on a lathe to be small and easy to use. For preference, I'd just cut up a regular carrot, but this is what I had available, and there's no sense buying something extra if something leftover will do just as well.
A chicken salt shaker. You don't need this. Furthermore, you should add neither salt nor a salt shaker to your stock. A stock is meant to be something that you add just as an ingredient, rather than as a dish in itself, so save your salt for when you make the final dish. The chicken shaker is in the picture because, honestly, a raw, plucked, whole chicken is not the most photogenic of beasts. You understand.
If you want to, you can add some sprigs of herbs and some whole spices (especially peppercorns) to the mix. It won't hurt, and will bring out some extra flavor.
Next, chop your vegetables roughly. These don't need to be terribly small nor uniform in shape, but don't be too lazy about it. Around the same shape. They'll be cooking for a long time, and you're not going to eat the vegetables when you're done, so you don't have to worry about them cooking at the same rate.
Load the vegetables into a slow cooker if you have one, or a Dutch/French oven if you don't. Put the chicken on top (removing any plastic bags from the interior of the chicken if there are any, but definitely add the neck if you get one with your chicken) and fill most of the way with water. Cook on low or around 250°F for 9-12 hours. When you're done, remove all the solid bits (the chicken should be quite edible, the vegetables not as much), decant and cool.
To cool, I like to put the stock in whatever containers it'll eventually live in, then put it in a cooler filled with ice or ice packs. After a few hours, I'll transfer to the fridge or freezer, depending on when I plan to use it. If you want to use it immediately, you don't even have to cool it, you could just remove the solid bits and go to work.
If it's in the fridge for a while, go ahead and take out the fat, which will have solidified on the top. You don't need it for the stock, and you can either save it for other applications or get rid of it.
It's worth noting that there are some (i.e. The French) who tend to go through a lot more trouble for stock. I like to think of this as "The Italian Method", because it's much less fussy and relies somewhat on the quality of the ingredients to pull it through. Making a stock the French Way can be a very rewarding experience that gains you a lot of valuable insight into the nature of food and how to extract a lot of flavor from food. To see how it works, the best reference I've seen is The Saucier's Apprentice by Raymond Sokolov (not the one by Bob Spitz). I strongly encourage anyone who really, really wants to make an amazing veal stock to read that and perhaps do it.
However, for day to day usage, this method works with just about any meat/bone combination, and is incredibly easy to do, as you can see. Let's put it this way: if it's a choice between one day doing something the French Way and using boxed/canned stuff in-between, or doing this now and ditching the boxed/canned stuff, then this will reward you so much more than waiting. But, when you're ready, The Saucier's Apprentice awaits.
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Reader Comments (7)
My mother taught me not to add the liver and heart to the stock water because they imparted a bitter taste to the end result. She would cook the liver separately when making gravy and add it later. Is this an old wives tale? I noticed you advise adding these things and since I've never actually made a stock that way I am now wondering if I am avoiding the addition when I don't need to.
This exactly how I dispose of a chicken. I usually can get two meals out of a raoster and then use the carcass to make stock. I've never done it in a slow cooker though - duh! What a great idea instead of steaming up my kitchen with simmering pots.
Liz, you are correct, and I will modify the post. I was thinking more of the neck and being cavalier about the other bits, but a liver especially would be bad. I don't think the heart would be a problem, but I'm not positive.
What Brian neglected to mention in this post was how amazing this makes your entire apartment smell.
A critical oversight. One I hope he doesn't repeat.
I apologize, Ben. In my defense, the kitchen in The Food Geek Compound nearly always smells wonderful due to some magical creation or another. And while I am not immune to the joys of the smells, I do sometimes forget to mention them. ;)
Lovely write-up, as always. I don't always have time to mess with making a stock, so I put my leftover chicken carcasses (usually a rotisserie chicken that I purchased one evening in a fit of laziness) in a large freezer bag then toss into my chest freezer. I also freeze my carrot ends, celery bits and such for making stock. When I'm ready, I drag it all out and throw in the pot.
A question - how do you store the stock? I always end up with more than I will use in a couple of days.
Thank you. I always freeze my stock, either as ice cubes or in plastic containers.