Making Chicken Bone Stock - September 9, 2019 @goldenoakfarm

When my husband finished stripping the carcasses, their weight was 48 lbs. They had been put into the freezer because I wasn’t doing stock until the next week.

On Sunday I did an inventory and I had 26 qts of stock left from 2017, when I had made 69 qts. I figured out how much stock I used each month, and how many months until the next time I would make it. I needed 43 qts.

I figured out years ago just how much of the ingredients would fit in each size of my stock pots. Then I figured out how much of each ingredient I would need if I did all 6 pots on the stove.

This is the basic single batch recipe:

My largest stock pot holds 6X, the 2 large stockpots hold 3X, my large Farberware holds 2X and the 2 small pots hold 1 recipe. All of these make about 40 qts. I figured that was close enough. I would still have a bag of carcasses left, as the total was 33# of carcasses for the 6 pots.

I started thawing the carcasses late, as I forgot they were frozen. They sat out all night, and were still half frozen by 5AM on Monday morning. I sent my husband to the store Sunday night for the needed vegs:

80 stalks of celery
32 large carrots
¼ lb of dried parsley
60 bay leaves

I had the 32 onions and the 8 heads of garlic, and the rest of the herbs and seasonings.

2 of the 6 bowls done

I set about chopping vegs, peeling garlic, and setting each pot’s batch up in huge bowls. I put our filtered water in them and they would sit overnight.

The Berkey filters decided they were plugged half way through that evening. I had no energy to take them apart so I struggled through the day on Monday with them like that. (We’ll fix them on Tuesday.)

I got up at 4:30AM and got the laundry started and was in the kitchen by 5AM loading the biggest stock pot. I put the onions and celery on the bottom (I use a diffuser under each big stock pot) to keep things from cooking down.

Then I put the carcasses in, and stuff each one with carrots. I stuff carrots and celery in all the crevasses on the sides and around the carcasses. I use the water from the bowls to fill the pot. The herb mix goes on top, and I add vinegar to each pot. The biggest gets 1½ cups and it tapers from there.

The goal on stock making day is to have them all cooking by 7AM. It wouldn’t happen this time due to frozen carcasses, but it would be close. As you can see they were all loaded and going by 7AM on Monday morning.

Every hour all day long I check them to make sure they don’t need topping up with water. Early on I put in vegs that wouldn’t fit at the beginning. Because the carcasses were frozen, I ended up with about 2# too much. I managed to get those into the pots by mid morning.

They will simmer until 7PM. My husband will help me with unloading and straining the stock. It’s to be 52F tonight, so I hope the canning kettles they are strained into will cool overnight.

Then we spend the next hour or so cleaning the mess off the stove. Knock wood, so far there’s not been much mess….

When we took the pots off the stove, we discovered a big mess on a back burner. We got the stock strained and outside to cool and left the mess and went to bed. I’ll clean it up Tuesday morning while he hangs doors.

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