How to Make Homemade Chicken Stock
Have you ever wondered how to make homemade chicken stock? It’s sooooo easy!! Once you’ve tried it, you’ll never throw away chicken bones again!
It feels weird to admit now that I had no idea that it was even a thing for people to make their own chicken stock until I met my husband. He actually made me chicken soup from homemade stock on our fist date. Let me tell you, I was impressed.
Fast forward 5 years, and now I can’t roast a chicken without saving the bones for stock. Homemade chicken stock is incredibly easy to make! It is also a great way to turn scraps and leftovers into a second nutritious meal for your family! Typically, I will roast a chicken for dinner one night, make a stock from the carcass, and use the stock and leftover chicken the following night to make chicken and sourdough biscuits, chicken soup, or chicken pot pies.
Homemade vs. Store Bought Chicken Stock
I am a bit eccentric when it comes to the quality of the food I feed my family. I don’t typically splurge or overspend in any other area besides high quality food. I’m of the mindset that our bodies run optimally when fueled with healthy, nutrient dense food. That is one of the reasons why I prefer to make my food at home whenever possible.
One of the ingredients on the label of 365 by Whole Foods Market, Organic Chicken Stock is “organic chicken flavor”. I don’t know about you, but I don’t know what chicken flavor is, and it kinda grosses me out to see ingredients like this listed. You will ALWAYS know what’s in your homemade stock because you’re the one adding ingredients.
Another benefit to making your stock at home is that you can customize it to your liking and nutritional needs. I like to add garlic and oregano to my stock around cold and flu season for the additional antiviral properties they infuse into the stock. I also like to add a few tablespoons of vinegar to pull more minerals out of the bones into my homemade chicken stock. You can doctor up store bought stock with herbs and seasonings, but you will never be able to pull more minerals from the bones.
Store bought stock typically lacks the collagen and gelatin content of homemade chicken stock. When you make stock at home, you will notice that it solidifies like jello in the fridge. This means it’s soooooo good!! The gelatinous form it takes on is from the actual gelatin from the cartilage which is amazing for your joints and skin.
What You’ll Need:
- Stock Pot – If I’m only doing one chicken, I use my 6 quart cast iron dutch oven, but if I’m doing multiple chickens, I use my large 12 quart stock pot.
- Colander
Ingredients:
You can use all sorts of ingredients when making homemade chicken stock. I typically use whatever I have on hand, and whatever sounds good in the moment.
- Chicken Carcass – Have the meat more or less removed from the bones, but leave the joints and connective tissue.
- Chicken Skins – This isn’t completely necessary, but there is a lot of great collagen and fat that comes out of the skin.
- Pan Drippings – I usually boil water and pour it on to my roasting pan and scrape up the drippings with a spatula. Then I pour everything into my stock pot.
- Onions
- Celery
- Carrots
- Bay Leafs
- Peppercorns
- Garlic
- Herbs
- Apple Cider Vinegar
Process:
- Put chicken carcass, skin, and drippings into your stock pot.
- Add vegetables, herbs, and spices.
- Add filtered water until the bones are just covered with water.
- Add apple cider vinegar.
- Turn the burner on low and let simmer for up to 48 hours, topping with water to keep the bones covered.
- After the stock is done, let cool and run through a colander to remove the bones and vegetable scraps. You can run the stock through some cheese cloth if you want to get all of the small solids out. It isn’t necessary though, especially if you plan to use the stock the following day for soup or pot pies.
Tips and Tricks for Making Homemade Chicken Stock:
- ALWAYS use filtered water, never straight tap water. Any of the junk in the city water will be concentrated as the water cooks down, so you could end up with heavy concentrations of things like fluoride in your stock. Chlorine in treated well water will evaporate during the cooking process, but I always use my AlexaPure filtered water.
- I like to save my vegetable scraps like onion tops and skins, carrot tops, and celery bottoms when I’m cooking by tossing them into a baggie in the freezer. That way I always have them on hand when I want to make homemade chicken stock! The celery will lose its structure in the freezer, but we only want it for flavor, so structure/texture won’t matter.
- Don’t leave an open flame unattended. If you have a gas range and can’t leave your stock to sit unattended overnight, let your stock cool, place a lid on it, and place it in the fridge overnight. In the morning, put it back on the burner and continue to simmer.
Alternative Cooking Options:
- Crock Pot – If you don’t have a good stock pot, you can always use a crock pot. You would follow the same process of adding all of the ingredients and covering with water, then turn your crock pot on low and let it go for 12-24 hours.
- Instapot -You can also use an Instapot. I’ve not tried this, so I can’t personally speak to this method, but you simply turn it on for 120 minutes for 3 cycles and you will have homemade chicken stock.
Items Mentioned in This Post:
- 6 quart Dutch Oven
- 12 quart Stock Pot
Recipes Mentioned in This Post:
- Chicken and Sourdough Biscuits
- Chicken Soup
- Chicken Pot Pies
Homemade Chicken Stock
Equipment
- 1 6 quart cast iron dutch oven
- 1 Colander
Ingredients
- 1 whole Chicken Carcass – Have the meat more or less removed from the bones but leave the joints and connective tissue.
- Chicken Skins – This isn’t completely necessary but there is a lot of great collagen and fat that comes out of the skin.
- Pan Drippings – I usually boil water and pour it on to my roasting pan and scrape up the drippings with a spatula. Then I pour everything into my stock pot.
- Onion scraps – tops and bottoms of 2-3 onions. You can also simply rough chop 1 whole onion instead.
- 3 Celery stalks
- 3 Large Carrots
- 2 Bay Leafs
- 1 tbsp Peppercorns
- 3 cloves Garlic
- Herbs to taste
- 2 tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1/2 Lemon
- Salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Put chicken carcass, skin, and drippings into your stock pot.
- Add vegetables, herbs, and spices.
- Add filtered water until the bones are just covered with water.
- Add apple cider vinegar.
- Turn the burner on low and let simmer for up to 48 hours, topping with water to keep the bones covered.
- After the stock is done, let cool and run through a colander to remove the bones and vegetable scraps. You can run the stock through some cheese cloth if you want to get all of the small solids out. It isn’t necessary though, especially if you plan to use the stock the following day for soup or pot pies.
