Nourishing Chicken Bone Broth
This nutrient-dense chicken bone broth is perfect for those sniffles or a simple cozy soup night. Rich in minerals and collagen, it is both delicious and nourishing. This broth can be pressure cooked in the instant pot in a matter of hours or slowly cooked the old-school way.
For most of us when we’re sick, chicken noodle soup almost immediately comes to mind. (Does anyone else find Campbells canned chicken noodle soup nostalgic of those childhood sick days?) In chicken noodle soup, the healing properties are in the broth. The bones are steeped in water for long enough that the collagen and all the bone minerals get extracted resulting in a broth that is nourishing, calming, and immunity boosting. It’s also easy on upset tummies and easy to digest.
The fun part about making your own broth is that you can customize what herbs, spices and vegetables you add to suit your particular need or situation. An example of this would be adding turmeric if you needed to get inflammation down, extra garlic if you needed an immunity broth, or ginger if someone was dealing with an upset stomach or nausea. Broth is also versatile for storage. It can be canned or frozen to use at a later date and is a really smart thing to have on hand in the pantry for a sudden sickness. You can drink it plain or use in chicken noodle soup (or any soup with a chicken base), asian noodle dishes, or flavored bone broth rice. You can also add bouillon to it for a stronger and saltier chicken flavor.
How to source bones for broth:
I would say sourcing is the most important part of this whole recipe! The amount of nourishment in the bones depends greatly on how the chickens were raised and how they were fed. As you might have guessed, I highly recommend connecting with a local farmer who free-ranges and/or pasture-raises their chickens, and who feeds at least non-gmo grain. Even if you can’t raise meat birds yourself, you can connect with other farmers who do and get to see first-hand where your food comes from. It’s a pretty special thing! And thankfully, most farmers are able to part with their bones for a decent price. If you want to go the grocery store route, we have tried Trader Joe’s organic whole young chicken and Aldi’s and have really enjoyed both. Or if you on a shoestring budget (like us many times!) or don’t have time to drive out to a farm, simply grab a rotisserie chicken, take off the meat and use that carcass! Sometimes ideal isn’t always doable and I still go the rotisserie route sometimes. The fact that you are reading this and gearing up to make your own bone broth in your own kitchen…friend, it’s SO exciting! You got this!
Like MawMaw and PawPaw
My Mawmaw is one of the best cooks I’ve ever met. Raised in the mountains of western NC, she cooked old-fashioned, southern, from-scratch meals 3 times a day for her farming husband and 4 children. I remember her soups and stews always tasting amazing, but she rarely ran to the store. Her secret? Bones and hocks. Before bouillon and soup base flavor packets existed, people would flavor their soups with the bones and organs of an animal, often times the cuts that you wouldn’t want to eat otherwise or wouldn’t know what to do with. The bones and marrow not only gave flavor to the soup, but nutrients too!
If you are able to grab chicken bones from a butcher or farm, make sure to specifically ask for chicken feet. (They look gross, I know, but you can do this!) Chicken feet has the highest amount of collagen because it’s cartilage. So, so good for your skin and hair. Chicken bones in general are rich in minerals: particularly calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, and potassium. Ancestral eating is often facing the reality of where food comes from. It’s not a pretty, Pillsbury, plastic kitchen – sometimes it’s weird chicken feet and burning eyes from cutting onions and a whole mess of dishes – but you are both nourishing and reminding your family of the beautiful lost art of from-scratch living. Like my MawMaw. It’s so worth it, friend.
Here is a photo of the “old home place” as the Conners call it: the recently renovated old farmhouse in western NC that my great grandma and grandpa built. Their son Wade (my Pawpaw) married a girl from the community named Evelyn (my Mawmaw) and they spent their first year married living in that little upstairs room that you could only reach through a tiny and twisted staircase in the wall. This is the house where my Mawmaw learned to cook from her mother in law, Ray. It’s a place of many special childhood memories for me. Opening that creeky old door that would slam shut behind you, you walked into a room with dark wood paneling, a huge burning wood stove warming the room and the smell of fresh biscuits, chicken + dumplings and gravy going in the kitchen. The room was filled with loud laughing, jokes and bluegrass music. Western NC is a very special place to me.
Methods to prepare chicken bone broth:
If you are in a pinch for time, an instant pot is a perfect choice. You can have a pressure-cooked bone broth strained and ready to go in a matter of hours. But if you plan to be home for the day and want a cozy, old-school cooking practice, I highly recommend the slow cook method. You can also use the instant pot or slow cooker for this, but I prefer the stove top method for one main reason: quantity! I have a huge stock pot that holds 16 quarts of water that I use for big canning or cheese projects. If I am going to invest in making bone broth, I want to make it worth my while! My stock pot makes enough to can for future use.
Ingredients for Nourishing Chicken Bone Broth
- Chicken bones and carcass, specifically chicken feet if you can find some
- 2 chopped onions
- 2 chopped carrots
- 2 chopped celery
- Garlic bulb, quartered
- 2 bay leaves
- Sage, thyme, oregano, rosemary. Fresh is best, but dried works just as well!
- Black peppercorns or ground pepper
- Salt
- Jalapeño, if you want a spicy kick
- Chicken bouillon, if you want extra chicken flavor. I recommend the organic “Better than Bouillon” brand
How to Make Nourishing Chicken Bone Broth
- *You can skip reading this step if you are starting with bones already separated* If you are starting from a whole, uncooked or frozen chicken, cook the whole chicken first. For this project, I started with a frozen organic Trader Joe’s chicken. I buttered the outside and seasoned the outside with thyme, sage, garlic powder, onion powder, and salt and pepper. I set the instant pot to “sealing”, and pressure cooked the chicken for an hour and a half, letting it naturally release afterwards for about 20 minutes. If you are starting with a thawed, refrigerated chicken, follow the same instructions, but pressure cook for only 30 minutes. Or if you are starting with a rotisserie from the store, you can skip all of those steps! Regardless of what you’re starting with, pull the meat off the bones and separate the bones.
2. Place the bones, onions, carrots, celery, garlic bulb, bay leaves, and herbs into your pot of choice (whether it’s an instant pot or large stock pot) and fill the rest of the pot with water.
3. If using an instant pot, close the lid and set to sealing. Pressure cook on high for 3 hours. Let it naturally release for 20 minutes before you release the pressure. If you are using a traditional, slow cook method on the stove, bring the pot to a quick boil, then bring the temperature to medium-low for 2 hours. After 2 hours, lower the heat even more to a simple simmer and let it simmer for 4-6 additional hours.
4 Strain through a colander into a pot to use right away or refrigerate or funnel broth into canning jars to begin canning process. (Canning directions below) If you are planning to freeze the broth, make sure to leave a little headspace at the top of your container to give your container space to expand. Nobody likes a chicken broth explosion in the freezer 🙂
5. Don’t throw those bones away! If you are really wanting to make the most of the bones you purchased, run them through the bone broth process again. This is a really frugal way to stretch the value of the chicken bones.
** If you are planning to can this chicken bone broth, follow these instructions from Ball Canning: Process filled jars in a pressure canner at 10 pounds pressure 20 minutes for pints and 25 minutes for quarts, adjusting for altitude, according to your pressure canners directions. Turn off heat: cool canner to zero pressure. Let stand 5 more minutes before removing the lid. Cool jars in canner 10 minutes.
Nourishing Chicken Bone Broth
Ingredients
Method
- *If you are starting from a whole, uncooked or frozen chicken, cook the whole chicken first and debone it. (See notes below)
- Place the bones, onions, carrots, celery, garlic bulb, bay leaves, and herbs into your pot of choice (whether it's an instant pot or large stock pot) and fill the rest of the pot with water.
- If using an instant pot, close the lid and set to sealing. Pressure cook on high for 3 hours. Let it naturally release for 20 minutes before you release the pressure. If you are using a traditional, slow cook method on the stove, bring the pot to a quick boil, then bring the temperature to low and let it simmer for 6-8 hours.
- Strain through a colander into a pot. Adjust spices, herbs, salt, pepper and bouillon to preference.
- Refrigerate or funnel into canning jars to begin canning process. (See notes for canning instructions) If you are planning to freeze the broth, make sure to leave a little headspace at the top of your container to give your container space to expand.
Notes
