Got a new deal on backs and necks of chickens last week. 40 pounds for 5 cents....$2.00.....added vinegar, celery, carrots, onion, salt and pecker.....cooked it in a 50 quart pot for 5 days. Strained it 3 times on cheese cloth. (The chickens got to eat all the strained stuff.) Let it cool to take off all the fat. (Saved the fat in snack baggies about half cup each) Put in freezer, will use for gravy or sauces. Canned the broth in 39 pints. They will sit on the pantry shelf for about a year until I use all the previous years of broth. I think I keep over 50 jars at all times. I use it anytime I need water. For cooking rice, adding moisture to chicken or roast. Always smells go good in the house when I can this stuff. Nest up: beef chunks and also bacon. That will empty my freezers a little.
I really didn't need to put up any chicken broth at the moment for I have about 40 from the past years still on my shelves. I just couldn't pass up on the price. Now I can use it more freely for a while. I use allot of chicken fat and of broth to it won't go to waste. I even have my hubby grabbing chicken broth instead of water... He makes rice and potatoes allot.
LOL ! You use some seasonings I have never heard of. Or you must have been looking out the window as you typed. Just joking with ya` !
Barb, do you roast the necks and backs before popping them into the stock pot? Once I had the grill going with some mesquite to smoke a pork roast, and on a whim I stuck all my chicken wings, backs, necks, etc. on the other half of the grill. I used the chicken parts for stock, and it was amazing (if I do say so myself). I have used it as a base for chicken vegetable soup and it's the best we've ever had.
Mart, I don't know what you are talking about...I didn't use any special seasonings...LOL marlingardener, I roast the chicken or turkey or beef bone before I start soup usually but I didn't do that this time. Just laziness...I guess..or maybe I didn't want to dirty my oven too badly before i start on cooking 50 pounds of bacon. That is next and wicked on my oven. Very happy to say she has a self cleaning mode....
Oh girls!!!! LOL Vinegar dissolves the bone adding calcium to the liquid. There are no bones left when I get done. That is bone broth. And the second question.......my so, very special and only child, always called pepper, pecker, and so we all just began to talk like the child out of love and cuteness. You know who that goes? Napkin is really "napnic", Christmas is Cribus.... Sort of bittersweet....we still talk like her to keep her in our thoughts....silly us...
Does it take the entire 5 days to dissolve them? My dogs would not like that. I usually just simmer mine about half a day and freeze.
I discovered the joys of bone broth this winter as well! I don't do it in as large batches as you Barb, but I really like having home canned broth in my pantry. I use apple cider vinegar but I don't cook mine as long because I still have bone left when I am done.
This is what is left after about 5 days. No bones celery, carrots, onions and parts of meat. I have tasted it and it tasteless. This is what the chickens get. mart, It probably doesn't take that many days. I keep the pot on the stove at a very low setting with a lid that sits inside the pot rim. Not one of those that reach over the outside edge of the pot. That way all condensation drips back into the pot and I never have to add water. That's just what my grandma did all my life. Netty, I use the same vinegar. You sure have come along way in the last few years... be proud of yourself..
