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Big-Batch Chicken Stock
Freeze your stock flat
Freeze it flat, then stack the bags like books. Leave room at the top, liquid expands as it freezes.
XXL Silicone Bag, Blue
One extra-large reusable silicone bag, about 135 oz, with a leakproof seal. Lies flat in the fridge or freezer.
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Homemade chicken stock costs almost nothing if you save the carcass, and it makes every soup you cook afterwards taste like someone knew what they were doing. This makes a full gallon in one pot, which is the amount worth the four hours. The catch with a gallon is storing it, and a stack of yogurt tubs is how good stock goes to waste at the back of a freezer. Two XXL silicone bags, about half a gallon in each and frozen flat, solve that: each becomes a thin slab you can stand up like a book and thaw in about twenty minutes.
Ingredients
- 3 pounds chicken bones, backs or two roast carcasses
- 5 quarts cold water
- 2 yellow onions, halved, skin on
- 3 carrots, cut in thirds
- 3 celery stalks, cut in thirds
- 1 head garlic, halved crosswise
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns
- 1 small bunch parsley stems
Directions
- Put the bones in a large stockpot and cover with the cold water. Starting cold pulls more gelatin out of the bones, which is what makes stock set like jelly in the fridge.
- Bring slowly up to a bare simmer over medium heat. This should take 30 minutes. Skim off the grey foam that rises in the first 15 minutes and discard it.
- Add the onions, carrots, celery, garlic, bay leaves, peppercorns and parsley stems. Do not salt the stock yet.
- Hold at the barest simmer, uncovered, for 4 hours. You want the occasional lazy bubble, never a rolling boil, which turns it cloudy and greasy.
- Strain through a fine sieve into a clean pot and discard the solids. Cool it quickly by setting the pot in a sink of iced water, stirring now and then.
- Divide the cooled stock between two XXL bags, about half a gallon in each, which leaves plenty of headspace for the stock to expand as it freezes. Seal, lay them flat, label with the date, and freeze on a sheet pan until solid.
Tips and variations
- Do not salt the stock. You will reduce it later in a sauce or a soup, and salted stock reduced twice becomes inedible.
- Roast the bones at 425F for 40 minutes first if you want a brown stock with a deeper, roasted flavor.
- Chill overnight and lift the solid fat cap off the top before freezing. That fat is schmaltz and is excellent for frying potatoes.
- Good stock sets to a wobble in the fridge. If yours stays liquid you needed more bones or a longer, gentler simmer.
- Freeze it flat and a gallon takes up the space of two hardback books instead of a bucket, and half a gallon thaws in a fraction of the time a tub does.
The bag this recipe is built around
The XXL Blue bag holds half a gallon of stock with room to spare for freezing, so one pot fills two bags with no tubs. Freeze them flat and each slab stands upright on a shelf and thaws in about twenty minutes under cool water. The tinted silicone also hides the frosted look that clear bags pick up in a cold freezer.
See the Blue XXL Bag
Common questions
- What is the difference between chicken stock and chicken broth
- Stock is simmered from bones and is unseasoned, so it sets to a gel from the gelatin. Broth is made from meat, is usually salted, and stays liquid when cold. Stock is the better base to cook from.
- Why should chicken stock never boil
- A rolling boil breaks up fat and protein and suspends them in the liquid, which leaves the stock cloudy and greasy. A bare simmer keeps it clear and clean-tasting.
- How long does homemade chicken stock keep
- Five days in the fridge, or six months frozen. Freezing it flat in a sealed bag keeps the flavor better than a part-full tub with air above it.
- Can I reuse the bones for a second batch
- You can, and it is called remouillage, but the second batch is much weaker. Use it as the water for your next first batch rather than as stock on its own.
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Copy this one onto a 4x6 card. Title across the top, the nine ingredients down the left, the six steps down the right, and Makes 1 gallon, Cook 4 hr along the header. File it behind the Soups divider. Built to outlast the screenshot.
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