My local grocery store had a CRAZY deal on whole chickens this last weekend. ($.59/lb) I bought four and decided to get a head start on my Fall/Winter cooking. I cooked the chickens and shredded the meat, then set out to make lots of stock!
For the chickens, I just place them in a large stock pot with water and a little salt. I cooked them over Medium-High for about 1 hour. Allow them to cool in the pot for about 30 minutes. This makes the meat really moist!
Do not dump the water, but remove the chickens and let them cool. I cooked 3 whole chickens and shredded the meat.
Portioned into freezer bags for winter soup...enough for 4 pots!
Skim the broth in the pots and add more water if desired. Chop two stalks of celery and two carrots per pot. No need to peel the carrots and keep the tops on the celery! Add half an onion, 2-3 bay leaves and about 1 TBS of peppercorns. I made two pots.
Add in the bones from the chickens and turn on the hot tub! Cook over Medium High for at least one hour....I cooked mine for 1 1/2 hours. Allow to cool before placing into containers.
I strain mine over a mesh strainer to remove all the peppercorns and such.
I like to put mine in a few different sized containers depending on what I will be using it for. I got 4- 5 cup containers, 6- 2 1/2 cup containers and 1- 6 cup container. That's a lot of soup! Thank goodness for the deep freeze :)
I do this about once a month! I freeze the stock, and I usually use the shredded meat for chicken enchiladas, chicken quesadillas, and BBQ chicken sandwiches. What other ideas do you have for ways to use the meat?
ReplyDeleteI also use it to make chicken salad, chicken tortilla soup, chicken and dumplings and paninis :)
ReplyDeleteThat looks nice and handy...I wish I had a freezer...I miss doing stuff like this! Unfortunately, I think the Barbie Dream House has a bigger fridge and freezer than this RV does!!
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