where did i go wrong? First time chicken soup...

[cambourne7]

I made roast chicken on sunday and had some veg that needed using up so i put the roast chicken into a pot of water and cooked it down then drained the stock into a pot with the raw veg (carrot, leek and potato) and picked the meat into the pot cooked till the veg was soft and popped a hand blender though. However it ended up very thick like over cooked mash potato?

I have added a pint of chicken stock to water it down but where did i go wrong?

[cambourne7]

[pippy]

I would add the raw veg in with the chicken carcass and water.  Make sure you have taken any excess skin off as this makes it fatty.  I also add a chicken oxo cube, salt, pepper, parsley (fresh or dried) and a bay leaf or bouquet garni if I have one.  No potatoes necessary.  Celery and onion and carrot necessary! Bring to the boil and simmer fo at least half an hour.  Take out the carcass and shred/pick off the meat.

Personnally I wouldn't liquidise it - its better chunky!

Yummmmm! :P

[kt.]

Wouldn't know where to start to make any soup.  Something I have never tried :-[

[cambourne7]

I would add the raw veg in with the chicken carcass and water.  Make sure you have taken any excess skin off as this makes it fatty.  I also add a chicken oxo cube, salt, pepper, parsley (fresh or dried) and a bay leaf or bouquet garni if I have one.  No potatoes necessary.  Celery and onion and carrot necessary! Bring to the boil and simmer fo at least half an hour.  Take out the carcass and shred/pick off the meat.

Personnally I wouldn't liquidise it - its better chunky!

Yummmmm! :P

I made the veg quite chunky so it needed to be liquidised and i did skim off the fat at the top :) I think the blender may have over done it....

[pippy]

I would guess the potato was the main culprit?  You need quite a lot less of potato than you think in soup and if the flavours are delicate it can absorb and smother them.  It's good with stronger flavours like leeks, chilli and curried soups, but be careful with chicken stock - the flavour is easily smothered.  Adding extra stock and salt/pepper was propably the right thing to do though!

[cambourne7]

ah yes might be right there......

Problem is that neither of us eat the dark meat on a chicken so its such a waste when we had a roast chicken. We do other things with the meat like pies and stir frys etc but i wanted to try soup.

[pippy]

I would have another go sometime - Like I say, miss out the potato and leave it chunky!

We use the leg meat for stir fries, pasta dishes, risottos and the like, then just do the carcass for a small amount of soup or stock (about 2 portions soup).  If you want stock, still add the veg and herbs, then just strain the liquid off and throw away the veg.  Although more often than not I can't bear to !!

Good luck.

[Barnowl]

I agree with everything Pippy has written except that I think I'd give Oxo a miss. Like most cubes it has a lot of salt (actually a bit more than the others)  but unusually for non-Asian cubes it also contains Monosodium Glutamate, Disodium 5'-Ribonucleotides and the dreaded hydrogenated vegetable fats. One thing that is absent is chicken meat! Admittedly I don't get on with MSG very well so am a bit biased :D

Rather curiously there's wheatflour in Oxo cubes. That isn't really a problem although it might have a thickening efffect.

I'd suggest the Organic Kallo instead. It's on offer in Sainsbury's and cheaper than Oxo at the moment, too  :)

[cambourne7]

does the chicken stock freeze?

[lolabelle]

Oh yes very well , as does homemade fish and beef stock

[froglets]

Hi camborne,

Plenty good advice here.  Just to add my two penneth', I strip the meat from the carcass and boil the bones ( no skin) for an hour and then drain off the liquid.  If there's any goo left in the bottom of the roasting tin I add that in, including adding some boiling water to the tin & stirring to loosen off the dark juices.  When the stock has cooled I put it in the fridge for a few hours and then lift off the fat layer on the top.  If I'm then going to make soup from it ( it could go to risotto or the freezer for stock later) I put in a handful off brown rice, a leek & some chunky carrots, some of the leftover scrappy bits of meat, a little salt to taste & boil for 20 minutes.

We like broth type chicken soup & you can substitute lentils for the rice & use any veg you have to hand.

Hope that helps.

[cambourne7]

Yes this is all good advice :) and I cant wait to try it all out :) Waitrose sell freezer bags for home made soups and stocks so i will stock up on some. Not going to be cooking for a week so i will have to resist the urge :)

[timnsal]

If you liquidise potato too much, it goes like glue. Horrible texture and taste is worse.  Learnt this the hard way :-[

When I started making soup, I discovered that it needs a lot more liquid to the amount of veg than I expected. Adding extra stock sounds like the ideal solution to the problem. Or you could add milk.

I make stock with the carcass, carrots and onions, and herbs if I can be bothered. It has loads of flavour, even without any seasoning. If you strain it well (eg through a sieve lined with kitchen roll), you can boil it down to reduce it to half the volume, so it takes up less freezer space. But don't do what I do, and go away and forget it. Burnt stock is highly embarrassing, believe me.

If you chill the stock before use, the fat floats to the surface and is easy to remove.

Sally

[Sinbad7]

My Jewish penicillin, is the carcass, stuffed of course, so I get the sage and onion stuffing thrown in, we don't eat the dark meat either, carrots, parsnip, swede, leeks, onions, celery and a chicken stock cube, cover with boiling water and simmer forever, then strain and have a clear soup.  Wasteful I know but very tasty and lovely with hot buttered toast.

[tim]

Odd man out, perhaps, but I don't find much worth left in a roast carcass.

I much prefer to do Poule au Pot & use that liquid for stock.

[pippy]

Barnowl - You are right about oxos - I used to use the "Just Boullion" ones but for some reason our local shop stopped selling them!  I will search out the kallo ones next time I'm in Sainsburys!

Thanks for the advice!

[Mrs Ava]

If I have a roasted carcass then I freeze it and wait until I have 2 or 3.  Like Tim, I don't think there is much oomph left in just one carcass that has been in the oven.  We favour the brown meat so often have breast meat left which I shred in.    I add cumin as I love that musty flavour, or dry corinader.  Spuds will always make a blended soup thickish and sometimes quite grainy - I'm not keen and tend to dice up spuds very small and cook them seperately adding them when serving.  If you want a slightly thicker soup, lentils, rice or dried soup mixes are great, I love Barley in soup.

[hellohelenhere]

My main tip for making stock, is bring it to the boil very slowly, skim it plenty, and never let it fast boil, especially at the beginning. If you do, the fats get emulsified into the liquid and the whole thing become kind of jellified when it cools. You can't skim the fat out because hardly any of it rises to the surface, and whatever you make with it will be oily.

To make skimming easier, it's best to start off with bones (and meat) only, till you've done most of the skimming, and then add the veg, herbs etc.

We eat a lot of chicken (my husband is from Virginia, proper Southern boy!) and every single bone goes for stock. We accumulate bones in the freezer till we have enough for a batch, and then freeze the stock. A really handy way to freeze it is in ice cube trays, it makes it easier to defrost the quantity you want.

[grannyjanny]

I put a small amount of potato & as Tim does add some soup mix, H&B do a nice one. When it's cooked I mash with the potato masher. Usually make it & take it to the lotty. Lovely on a cold day.
Janet.

[lottie lou]

Fresh bones make a better stock.  I tend to bone a chicken, stuff it, then sew it up the back so that it is reformed into a chicken and then roast it in foil finishing with the foil opened so that it browns.  (pull out the cotton used for sewing before serving).  That way you get fresh bone stock.