Chicken Broth
Grandma was right—chicken broth is good medicine!
Sipping broth keeps you hydrated, and chicken soup has long been known to have mild anti-inflammatory properties, which helps keep your immune system strong. One reason for this is that garlic contains allicin, a potent antimicrobial compound. Onion skins add a rich, golden color to your broth. Even better, this pigment contains an antioxidant called quercetin that helps regulate blood pressure, and reduces plaque in the arteries and inflammation in the body.
Risottos, vegetables, braises and soups—countless dishes are enlivened with the addition of chicken stock. Far more than just a flavorful liquid, chicken stock is also nutritionally dense. Cup for cup, it packs nearly as much protein as plain yogurt, and supplies more than a quarter of the recommended daily allowance of niacin, a B vitamin that helps the digestive system, among other things. Considering that canned stock can contain half the recommended daily allowance of sodium, it’s also good to know that you control the ingredients of stock you make at home.
Easily more delicious than anything you can buy at the store, homemade chicken broth is also simple, economical, and good for you.
Ingredients
a soup chicken, or two
2 onions
a few small cloves of garlic
3-5 quarts cold water
1 bay leaf
a bunch of thyme
Procedure
Place the chicken in a stockpot or crockpot or Instant Pot.
Add two quartered onions, leaving the skins on. Whenever we peel an onion for cooking, we like to save the peels in a Ziploc bag and keep them in the freezer, just for stock. Add a few cloves of garlic. Since you are not going to eat the garlic itself, there’s no need to peel it. The tiny cloves from the inside of the garlic head are perfect for stock. Include a couple of carrots and some bay and thyme, if you can.
Cover the chicken, vegetables, and aromatics with cool water and simmer on low for at least an hour or for as long as 24 hours.
My go-to time for broth in an Instant Pot is 130 minutes on high pressure.
Remove the broth from the heat and let it cool, uncovered, in the fridge for several hours or overnight.
A golden yellow layer of fat will form over the top of the pot when it is ready. Skim this layer off with a spoon. The broth below will be chunky and jiggly, almost like soft gelatin. The texture is so thick not because of its fat content, which is negligible, but because the liquid is especially high in collagen—yet another health benefit of this home-cooked, slow-cooked food.
Heat the pot a little so that the stock thins out enough to pour.
Strain the broth through a mesh sieve (or a colander lined with cheesecloth) into a second large pot or bowl.
Remove the soup chicken/s to a plate and remove the meat from the bones. If you can handle eating a rotisserie chicken, you can do this part, too!
Use the broth right away for soup, or divide it into glass quart jars or Ziploc bags to freeze for later.
Be sure to allow about an inch of headspace at the top of the jars or bags so the liquid has enough room to expand when it freezes, and place a dish underneath the jars or bags while freezing to catch any drips or leaks.
You can also view our recipe at Clean Eating Magazine.