Taking Stock

Before I start talking about homemade stock, let me first say that I have store-bought stock in my pantry. A lot of it. Mostly, it's the little juice box-sized containers of stock. Not only do they taste better than the canned stuff but they are also the perfect size for most weeknight recipes. I am not a stock snob.

That said, the stock in my pantry is just back up. Most of the time, I cook with the homemade chicken stock in the fridge. Making stock shouldn't be production. Once you get into the habit, it can become just another part of your cooking routine. Here's what you need:

• Chicken bones
  
• Water
  

Everything else is a bonus. Aromatics – garlic, onions, carrots, and celery all help but in a pinch you can live without any or all of them. Thanks to my deck garden, I always have fresh herbs in the summer. In the dead of winter, I have dried. They work just fine.

I buy a rotisserie chicken pretty much every week. It's a staple in my "Oh crap, what am I making for dinner tonight" repertoire. As I eat it, I throw the bones in a bag in the freezer. And as I cook, I save all the ends from the onions, carrots, and celery (save the leafy parts, they taste great) that I cut off and throw them in another bag in the freezer. If I use fresh herbs like thyme, I save the stems. See a pattern here? Then on Sunday afternoon, I pull out the bags and see what I have got.

The curse of the cloudy stock

I have a stack of cookbooks with dire predictions like, "you have to skim off the scum every 15 minutes or it will be cloudy" and "never let stock come to a full boil or it will be cloudy." Whatever. I suppose if I were making a soup for a fancy dinner party, I would care more about the relative transparency of my stock but most of the time I am using it to make gravy or grits or something else opaque that really won't suffer from dreaded cloudiness. Screw the rules. Throw everything in the pot and walk away.

NOTE: I have tried making stock in my crock pot. I did achieve perfectly clear stock that tasted good but it was totally liquid. Yes, I realize by nature, stock is a liquid but this is what separates the homemade stuff from the stuff in the pantry. When you boil bones, the collagen comes out. The longer you boil it, the more collagen you get. Let it go long enough, you get chicken jell-o. It sounds disgusting but when you use it to make gravy or sauce, you have a built in thickening booster. But if your goal is perfect clear stock, chuck everything in your crock pot, set it to high, and walk away for six hours.

Chicken Stock

Ingredients

• Chicken carcass – skin and edible meat removed
  
• 1-2 carrots (depending on how many ends you have)
  
• 1 medium onion (plus ends/skins)
  
• 1-2 stalks of celery
  
• 3-4 cloves of garlic
  
• Herbs – I like thyme and sage, but use what you like
  
• A handful of peppercorns (~12)
  
• Dash of salt
  
• Water
  

Directions

Break or cut the main part of the chicken into a couple of pieces. Put the chicken bones in a 3-4 quart pot on the stove and crank the heat up to medium high. I like to brown the bones up a little but this step is totally unnecessary. Cut up the carrots, onions, and celery so they fit in the pot. Smash the garlic cloves. Throw them in the hot pot. Throw in the herbs, salt, and pepper. Pour in enough water to cover everything. Let it come up to a simmer and then turn the heat down low. Now walk away and let it go, for a couple of hours if you can. The longer you let it go, the better it will taste. Strain out all the bones and veggies and peppercorns. Cool and store in the fridge. It's easier to scrape the fat off once it's been in the fridge for a couple of hours.