Hello! This recipe is what we start with for every other recipe on the site. Over the years, we’ve found that a very simple base, without a lot of vegetables is the key to an amazing, clean and flavorful broth that is easily adapted for many other uses. We started with Rick Bayless’ recipe which has it’s roots in Mexico and modified it slightly to create this amazing base. Feel free to comment below on what you think and if you made any changes – we’d love to hear from you!
Table of Contents
The Master Chicken Broth Recipe
Our Favorite Chicken Broth Recipe
Hello! This recipe is what we start with for every other recipe on the site. Over the years, we’ve found that a very simple base, without a lot of vegetables, is the key to an amazing, clean and flavorful broth that is easily adapted for many other uses. We started with Rick Bayless’ recipe which has its roots in Mexico and modified it slightly to create this amazing base. Feel free to comment below on what you think and if you made any changes – we’d love to hear from you!
Ingredients
- 3-4 lbs whole chicken split with organs removed
- 1 medium white onion – peeled, halved, and sliced thin
- 1 Head garlic – cut in half width-wise (see pictures below)
- to taste fresh coarse ground black pepper
- 1.5 tablespoon salt
Instructions
- To get started with the broth, separate the chicken into the body, legs, and wings. I usually cut off the breast meat and save it for another recipe – you don’t need that much flesh to get the great-tasting broth.
- Fill a 6 qt pot about 3/4 full with hot water and place each piece of chicken into the pot. Adjust the water level so that you have about 2 inches of free space at the top of the pot.
- Put the pot on the stove over medium heat and let the water heat up slowly – you don’t want a vigorous boil. As the water approaches a boil, skim off any gray foam that forms on the top – if you don’t see any, wait a bit, it will come. At first, the foam will be in small patches on the surface but will eventually take over the pot.
- While you’re waiting for the water to heat, peel, halve and slice the white onion and cut the garlic in half as shown below:
- After the foam has subsided, add the salt, onions, and all of the garlic. Set the temperature so that you have a very low boil. You want to see a few bubbles bursting on the surface but not agitating the water too much. Let this simmer for about two hours stirring every 30 minutes or so.
- As time goes on the broth will get more and more cloudy as the flavor gets richer and richer. See the pictures below for an example of what the broth should look like after one hour and two hours.
- Use a medium-mesh strainer over a large bowl to strain out all of the solids. You’ll get a beautiful golden broth in the bowl with a nice layer of fat on top.
- I like to keep all the fat because it adds amazing flavor, but if you’re going for a lower-fat broth, you can skim some of it off once the broth has cooled a bit.
- The broth is now ready for use. If you’ve got another recipe to use it in, get started – otherwise I like to store the broth 2 cups at a time in plastic storage bags.
