Chicken broth

[windycitysmokin]

hope this is he right section to post this, and it’s not technically smoking related so forgive me, but here goes.

I cook a whole chicken every Sunday. Either roasted or smoked. Then part it out for lunch m-f. So I’m curious about using the bones to make my own chicken broth. I prefer using chicken broth in a lot of recipes that call for water (quinoa, rice, mixing taco seasoning, etc). Not too mention, Home made broth is better than store bought and it’s using the whole animal.

So my question is - what’s a good water to bone ratio? Everything I can find online is basically saying just cover the bones. However, it appears as if they’re talking about for 5ish birds worth of bones, where as I’m doing 1 or 2 birds. I don’t want to do too little water and it not extract all the goodness from the bones bc the water gets too saturated before that happens, and definitely don’t want to do too much water and have bland broth flavored water.

Any input here is great.

Tia

 

[old sarge]

The amount of water needed is dictated not by the size of the carcass alone but also by the size of the pot. A pasta pot with insert makes a good choice with the insert aiding in the removal of the bones and such after they fall apart. You do have to cover the bones with water. You can vac seal or zip lock bag seal the carcass and freeze till you have accumulated enough to use you larger stock pot if you don't have a smaller pot.

 

[johnmeyer]

I am not a stock expert, but I've made it enough times to know that you also want some meat on those bones. Most people take the wing tips, neck, and backbone, before cooking, and throw those into a freezer bag. When the bag gets full, they make stock.

Those who are really serious about their stock sacrifice an entire, uncooked chicken.

I'm sure you have lots of recipes for stock in various cookbooks. The Cook's Illustrated folks call for one 3-pound chicken and 8 cups of water. So, there is one ratio to get you started. Just scale it up or down, depending on how many pounds of leftovers you have, and do try to use chicken that still has some meat on the bones, or I think your stock will taste thin.

Finally, most stock recipes call for a few vegetables, especially onions. Stock is a great way to not only use up the leftover chicken, but also all those vegetables in the bottom of the fridge that are still OK, but on the edge of not being OK.

 

[AllAces]

The bones from one chicken will make six quarts of broth. Been doing it this way for 30 years.