I was never one for homemade stock until I got an Instant Pot. Now, it's one of my favorite things to make. Very easy, mostly hands off, and you end up with a very tasty finished product.
All you need are things you likely have laying around already: chicken bones and vegetable scraps. You can use bones from a $5 rotisserie chicken like I have here, or leftover from your voodoo rituals. For the vegetables, I like to keep a gallon freezer bag to put trimmings from garlic, onion, and celery in and just stash in the freezer until it's full. You'll get plenty of flavor from the peels and ends you were going to throw away anyway. One full bag gets about two batches of stock.
Additional seasonings that don't fit in the first picture: kosher salt, black peppercorns, bay leaf, and apple cider vinegar. They say the vinegar does something with the bones and extracts more flavor or something. I dunno. It's a splash, if you got it put it in, if not don't worry.
Put your bones, veggie scraps, seasonings, and about 12 cups of water into the Instant Pot. I think I put in too much pepper because this broth is a little spicier than usual. Live and learn. I literally don't measure this at all, just do what feels right in your soul. The only reason I know I used 12 cups is because I used a measuring cup to transfer from the sink to the pot. I usually use the Brita from the fridge, but it was low. As you can see, I also added some baby carrots that were sitting in the fridge for some extra flavor. Seal the pot and cook on high pressure for 2 hours.
When it's done, I like to let it natural release for at least a half hour. This ended up going for just under an hour because I was watching Wrestlemania. Marked difference from how it all looked before pressure cooking. Everything has given up its flavors.
Set up a draining rig in your sink, just in case of some splashing. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A BOWL UNDER THE COLANDER TO CATCH THE STOCK! I've read too many horror stories about people spending all day on a beautiful stock and then pouring it down the drain. Don't be that guy!
Carefully pour out the contents of the pot into the colander. As you can see, the bones are clean and everything is gross and flavorless. Except for the pot of stock, which is now awesome and flavorful.
An optional but highly recommended step is a second filtering to remove small bits of sediment. I use peels and roots and end up with bits of dirt in there, I'm sure. I'm not worried about the germs because it boils for 2 hours, but it just doesn't look nice. This is a double layer of cheesecloth in a metal strainer held in place by two binder clips. More clips would be nice, but I have two so that's what I used. Definitely better than trying to hold it and pour hot stock at the same time though.
If it wasn't for this second filtering, all that junk would be in your pot and nobody wants that. Cheesecloth can theoretically be washed, dried, and reused but it's cheap and you get a bunch from Amazon so I just toss this. As I'm fond of saying, you do you boo.
It's hard to photograph this in the pot because it's very dark, but the spoon gives you a bit of an idea. Nice golden color, very flavorful, smells amazing. Definitely worth the small investment of time to get this out of what would have been trash.
Notes:
- You can make this on the stove if you don't have an Instant Pot. I've never done it, but I'd say put everything in a big pot, cover with water, and simmer for a couple hours.
- I like to use the stock instead of water when making rice or instant mashed potatoes for extra flavor.
- I also like to just drink the stock by itself. I'll usually have a couple cups to sip on while I'm waiting for it to cool down enough to package and store in the fridge.
- You can freeze this for long term storage, but mine's never lasted that long. If you want to be fancy, pour it into ice cube trays, freeze, then put the stock cubes into a freezer bag.
- In addition to a bag of vegetable scraps, you can also have one for chicken bones (or just animal bones in general) and save those as you cook. Then you can get stock without having a rotisserie chicken, but in my mind those $5 chickens are one of the best investments you can make.
Enjoy drinking your garbage!
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