Chicken stock from scratch

One thing I love having on hand is chicken stock. I have that 'Better Than Bouillon' stuff  that I keep on hand, I like the beef, and vegetable  as well as the chicken  flavors (I've been meaning to try the mushroom but haven't yet and after setting up that link I saw a clam and lobster flavor, yum!).

But I really love having homemade stock on hand, partially because I love the fat content, the little golden puddles that top the broth. When someone is sick I use this broth to make them a soup,  I feel it works better than store bought, no matter how good the store bought is.

The last chicken from last summers butchering. I also had some scrap pieces  of chicken from when my dad gets a 50lb box of chicken breasts from the restaurant supply store, there tends to have  unwanted fat and tendons on some of them so we clean them up before dividing them into smaller portions and putting them in the freezer. We keep those scraps to make stock and gravy.

Here is the scraps cooking in my cast iron pot. I use this pot because of the wonderful caramelization  I can get with it. 

I just tossed them in the hot pan with a little olive oil and salted them. (Hot for a cast iron like this is Medium, you don't want to use the high setting with cast iron, it's gets plenty hot on Medium, trust me).

About half way done  before I  put in the water and the whole bird. I really want these pieces to get that golden color as much as possible.

What the bottom of the pan looks like after I took out the scrap pieces. (I cooled them and used them as dog treats. Waste not, want not and all that, Layla loved it)

This is just adding water and the whole bird to the pot. Look how golden it is already, and those puddles of fat, yummy. I let this simmer for 6+ hours total, refilling the water twice. The first time I took the bird out and  took off it's meat for dinner later that night, I returned the bones back to pot, filled it with more water and let it simmer some more. The second time I removed the bones and added more water, I wanted more broth than what was in there. When it was the right rich flavor I poured it into a pitcher to cool.

Any meat or other solids will sink to the bottom, the stock is in the middle and that gorgeous fat floats to the top. Once this was cooled I filled ice cube trays and put it in the freezer.  I like having the small cubes of stock to add to sauces and vegetable dishes. If I have enough stock I will also put it in large ziplock containers to go in the fridge, that way when I need to make soup I just pull it out to thaw or add some really hot water to melt it. I tend to dilute the stock with hot water so when I'm cooking it down I make sure it's extra strong so when I add the water it doesn't lose it's flavor.