Stock is a basic ingredient in any kitchen for preparing a wide variety of dishes, be it vegetable stock, or stock from fish, poultry or meat such as beef or lamb. Stock has graduated from being a staple of soups and sauces to become an essential ingredient in many food preparations. It is often used to transform traditional preparations in a way that makes the guests wonder what the secret ingredient was. Making stock is a time consuming process and hence the popular practice of making a large quantity at one go and freezing it for later use is very common. The principle behind stock is fairly simple, to simmer bones and scraps (or vegetables) in boiling water for a long duration in order to release all their essential nutrients, oils and flavors, and to spice it lightly so that it can be used as the starting point for any preparation. Here is a step-by-step guide for making perfect chicken stock.
Complexity Level: Basic
Time Required: 3 hours
Resources Required:
- Chicken (whole or scraps and carcass)
- Vegetable (carrots, onions, celery)
- Bay leaves, black peppercorn, and salt.
- Large pot
- Freezer containers to store single-use portions in
Instructions:
1. Get all the ingredients together
Cut the vegetables coarsely. Wash the carcass or scraps in running water. Fill the large pot with water. For each whole chicken carcass that you are making a stock from, allow about 6 quarts of water.
2. Put them all to simmer
Throw in the chicken, the vegetables, the bay leaves and peppercorn, and a conservative teaspoon of salt for each whole chicken carcass into the cold water. Put the water to boil.
3. Keep skimming the stock to keep it clean
Once it comes to a boil, turn the flame to a low heat and let the stock simmer. Take a shallow ladle (you can get a stock skimmer that is like a shallow strainer), and remove the whitish fat that comes up with the foam. You will need to do this very frequently in the initial stages, as more of the gunky fat is released, but after the first hour, you can do this once every ten or fifteen minutes.
4. Let it simmer for three hours
Leave it on low flame and let it simmer away, checking once in a while to skim the white froth that collects on top. Once you have simmered it for about three hours, allow it to cool down.
5. Strain the stock
Once it is cool enough to handle, strain it out into another large pot. Divide it into portions that you will use at one time and freeze them for later use.
Frequently Asked Questions:
How do I store stock?
Stock can be refrigerated or frozen. Stock stays well in the refrigerator safely for up to a week if you take it out once every alternate day and give it a good boil. Stock can stay frozen for up to three or four months. Avoid contamination between the time you take it off the boil and the time that you freeze it. Store it in single portion containers so that you can take out just how much you need and no more.
Quick Tips:
- You can use a whole chicken to make stock. You can strip the flesh off the bones after you strain the stock and use the flesh as chicken base for any other dish.
- Vegetables that have been lying around but have not yet gone bad can be thrown into your stock. There are no hard and fast rules about what can and cannot be used in stock.
- Instead of throwing them away, you can collect chicken (or meat) scraps from your day-to-day cooking and store them separately in the freezer. Once you have a sizable amount, you can use it to make stock.
- Skip the salt. Since the stock reduces significantly over the time that you simmer it, your estimation of salt will be equally significantly impacted. One way out of this is not to salt it at all and add salt as needed when you are preparing a dish with it.
Things to Watch Out For:
- Never make stock by adding the ingredients to hot or boiling water as this tends to lock the flavors into the meat and vegetables, and prevents the extraction of collagen.
- Keep in mind how much salt you have added to the stock when you use it later for cooking. A common kitchen disaster when using salted stock is to end up with a salty dish that is beyond repair.
