Chicken Stock

This is the idea that got me started on this nonsense to begin with. About a month ago I was cutting up some vegetables to make something that I don't remember, and I was thinking about how much I detritus I produce in the process of cooking vegetables. One wants to feel virtuous when cooking with fresh produce, but here I am tossing out handfuls of potato skins, carrot shavings, onion skins, parsley stems, etc. I know that all of this can be composted, and I do make an effort to do that. But I felt like in the Depression, or on the Frontier people knew how to make use of this so-called waste and I wanted to know that too. It turns out that plenty of real modern day people already have that knowledge and all a girl has to do is utilize a little piece of twenty-first Century magic called "Google" to learn the secrets too. But sometimes it takes a little extra push to actually make something happen.

So my internet search on how to make chicken stock netted me a wide range of options, from boiling multiple whole chickens and pounds of fresh vegetables (which I'm sure gets you a really rich and amazing stock) to doing entirely with scraps, (which is what I opted for.)

Since I knew for about a week that I was going to do this after I roasted a chicken I began collecting scraps in a ziploc bag that I kept in my freezer, everytime I chopped up an onion, or peeled a carrot, or a potato I put the scraps into this bag. After we roasted the chicken and pulled all the meat off that we were going to eat, I put the remaining carcass and skin in another bag in the freezer. When I was ready I put the bones and skin in a large stock pot and covered it with cold water Then added about 1/2 tsp salt and 1/4 tsp pepper and brought it to a boil, then immediately lowered it to a simmer and let simmer uncovered for four hours. After about an hour I added the bag of vegetables (use whatever you think would be good in a stock. Not all vegetable are right for this. Carrots, potatoes, onions, parsley, celery, garlic and a little bell pepper are what I used.)
After four hours I strained it and had about 5 and half cups of stock. I'll let you know how it tasted when I have the opportunity to use it.

My favorite part of this particular recipe is that it is essentially free. I made it entirely with food parts that I would otherwise have thrown away. And chicken stock is something that is called for in so many recipes. It was an item I tried to always have on hand in the past, so it is exciting to know how easy it is to make from scratch. And for an added bonus, my house smelled wonderfully chickeny and homey the whole time it was cooking.