Chicken Broth Soup

Here is how to make wonderfully healthy and inexpensive chicken broth.

We love the fully cooked rotisserie chickens sold at our local grocery store. In fact, every time we make a big shopping trip to Costco I purchase one of their rotisserie chickens. By the time I get all my Costco purchases home and stored away I am too tired to make a full dinner.

Those rotisserie roasted chickens make a wonderful table presentation when transferred to a serving platter. All I add is a salad or a vegetable and you have a perfectly acceptable meal. Many times I will buy the tasty Costco deli potato salad too.

What a better way to feed a hungry family (or yourself) with minimum fuss after a long day at work and then a crowd filled shopping trip to the big box store!

This will make you feel even better about purchasing that rotisserie chicken. In fact, you will feel thrifty. If you have any remaining chicken you can carve it off to make a sandwich or put in the freezer. Chicken pieces when frozen like this are great to toss in home made soups or add to canned soups. They also may be added to gravies and the like.

What you have left is the carcass and that too has value! A chicken carcass has lots of good nutrition and flavor left. It is easy to make a lovely broth.

All you need to do is place the chicken carcass in a Dutch oven and cover the chicken carcass with filtered water. Then you add some seasonings, bring it to a boil, and reduce the water and chicken carcass to a simmer. Cook this until the water reduces down at least 25%.

This broth is wonderful to freeze in small cube sizes. Or freeze the broth in a larger one time use size container.

The cubes of rich flavorful chicken broth can be used to create another flavor layer in:

~soups (purchased or home made)

~stews

~gravies

~an addition to the water to boil noodles or pasta in

~instant potatoes

~rice

The larger batch can be used as a base for any dish that requires adding water. It will make a wonderful chicken noodle soup base, a stew base, and a vegetable soup base. It is the major player in a wonderful egg drop soup too!

The key to making any food better is to layer the flavors. This is such a wonderful base flavor layer.

This chicken broth makes a great base for a garlic soup that is very soothing and healthful when you have a cold. Just use a quart (or more) of the broth with one whole head of garlic. Separate the cloves, remove the paper, and roughly chop the cloves. Simmer for 20-30 minutes, strain, and then take as needed. It will taste good and help you feel better. Both garlic and chicken broth are known to help when you have a cold. They are anti bacterial and anti inflammatory.

The basic chicken broth soup aroma smells lovely too. How nice for your family to come home to this on a cold day.

Here is the recipe.