Stock is the basis not just of soups, but an ingredient in numerous stews and other dishes. A good one can make a deceptively simple dish seem like an elegant masterpiece.
You’ve roasted your chicken. You’ve eaten the readily accessible meat. Don’t throw away the bones and the meat that you’d really have to work at to get. Break the carcass up and put it in a big pot. Cover it with water and add a bay leaf, some cracked pepper, a yellow onion, halved with the skin on, a couple broken carrots and a stalk of celery. Bring it to a boil then turn it down to a simmer – bubbles just breaking the surface now and again. Skim off any foam. Or don’t. It doesn’t affect the flavor.
After it’s simmered for a couple hours, strain out the broth. You can cool the bones and take off any meat that’s left for another use or to add to the soup when it’s done. The broth should taste rich. If it doesn’t, you want to take this strained version and reduce it – boil it off until it’s lost about a quarter of its volume. Taste it again. After it’s reached a point where it tastes like soup, let it cool a bit before refrigerating or freezing it over night. Then you can easily skim off the fat and discard it. The resulting stock can be used as the basis for soup, or you can freeze it – I do it in two-cup portions for cooking, and quart containers for soup purposes.
If you don’t want to make soup the day you roast your chicken, put the bones in a freezer bag and save them. You can wait until you have a bunch of bones to make a really big batch and then freeze it. And if you like making soup, I recommend purchasing turkey or chicken wings or backs (which are dead cheap and any meat counter can either find you some or direct you to the part of the freezer section where they are.) Bony pieces make rich stock.
Make the broth a meal by adding some sliced peeled carrots and parsnips, some chicken meat (either saved from the original roast chicken, or a diced up boneless skinless chicken breast or two), some cubed potatoes, rice or pasta, a couple of stalks of sliced celery, and at the very end of the cooking time, some peas, or some nice hearty greens like chard or kale. Make it more of a meal by adding some beans – kidney or garbanzo. You can give your soups an international flavor by playing with spices, too. Add some lime juice, chopped fresh cilantro, and cumin for a south of the border flavor. A little cayenne pepper will give it some kick. Garlic, red pepper flakes, grated fresh ginger, and a dash of roasted sesame oil makes it more Asian inspired.
If you want to make a quick and luscious soup, take a quart of your stock and add a can of pumpkin or two cups of mashed squash and some grated fresh ginger. Instant fabulous pumpkin soup. This also works with curry powder. Top either off with some toasted pumpkin kernels and a dollop of sour cream or plain yogurt. A loaf of bread, some salad, a bottle of wine and you have an instant dinner that’s healthy and elegant.
