Best Chicken Stock
A simple, versatile white chicken stock — no roasting of bones or vegetables required. Chicken stock is the secret ingredient of restaurant food: a good stock should have decent body along with a mild savory flavor that enhances, rather than competes with, the sauces, glazes, and soup bases you make with it.
⏱️ Prep: 90 min🍳 Cook: 90 min🍽️ Makes 12
Ingredients
| 4-8 pounds | chicken parts (wings, bones, breasts, legs) | |
| 4 quarts | 3.8 l | water |
| 2 | large yellow onions, diced | |
| 4 | large carrots, diced | |
| 4 | large celery ribs, diced | |
| 8 | crushed medium cloves garlic | |
| 2 | large sprigs parsley | |
| 2 packets | unflavored gelatin dissolved in 1/2 cup cold water (optional) |
Instructions
- Combine chicken, water, onions, celery, garlic, and parsley in a large stockpot and bring to a simmer over low heat. Lower heat, maintaining a very gentle simmer, and cook for 1 hour 30 minutes.
- Strain stock through a fine-mesh strainer, let cool, then transfer to containers and refrigerate until completely chilled, about 6 hours.
- Skim off and remove any fat and scum on the surface. Refrigerate for up to 5 days or freeze for up to 6 months.
- If stock is thin even after being fully refrigerated, add the optional gelatin solution to the stock and bring to a boil until fully dissolved, then refrigerate or freeze.
YIELD: makes about 12 cups. ACTIVE TIME: 1 hour 30 minutes. TOTAL TIME: 1 hour 30 minutes. Special Equipment: stockpot, fine-mesh strainer.
Notes — the keys to a rich stock:
- Chicken: stock can be made with a whole chicken, any of its parts, or a combination — usually the scraps and bones of a chicken already butchered for other uses. In testing, boneless chicken breast produced the cleanest tasting stock with the most intense chicken flavor, but the thinnest body; wings produced the most body (thanks to the cartilage-rich joints) but less chicken-y flavor; bones added pleasant bass notes; a whole chicken was middle-of-the-road. Wings are the single best value for a balance of rich texture, decent flavor, and low cost. If possible get some white meat in the mix for flavor, along with bones for bass notes and wings for gelatin.
- Boosting body: if you make a thin but flavorful stock, adding a little unflavored gelatin helps. One packet softened in 1/4 cup cold water, mixed into 1 quart of stock, enhances body without making it sticky.
- Aromatics: plain boiled DICED aromatics tasted best — both clean and flavorful. Whole aromatics gave the least flavor (less surface area for extraction); sautéing the aromatics first gave a darker stock with a less-fresh, overcooked vegetable flavor.
- Skimming: at a very gentle simmer you can safely skip skimming — the not-skimmed stock came out just as clear. Keep the heat low and use a fine-mesh strainer; remove the fat once the stock has chilled and the fat has congealed on the surface. (Larger batches may generate a deeper grease layer that could affect flavor and clarity.)
- Ratio and time: don't dilute too much. Use at least 2 pounds of chicken per 2 quarts of water (a 1:2 ratio by weight); more chicken makes a richer, more gelatinous stock. For every 2 quarts of water add at least 1 large diced onion, 2 large diced carrots, 2 ribs of celery, and about 4 crushed cloves of garlic, plus a tuft of parsley (fresh thyme and bay leaves are also good). About 1 1/2 hours of gentle simmering is a reasonable end point.
From http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/10/best-rich-easy-white-chicken-stock-recipe.html