I spent the weekend making brown “poultry” stock to use as a replacement for store bought “beef” broth which is mostly a broth of yeast extracts, according to an article from Kenji a few years ago. I do two four hour cycles in my 10-quart Instant Pot with a full natural pressure release, using the same bones in both batches. Between roasting the bones ahead of time, the two batches of pressure cooking, and the cooling of the broth so it turns gelatinous before packaging, it’s a multiple day process.
When I roast a chicken or turkey, I strip the carcass after roasting and freeze the bones until I have at least five pounds of bones saved for stock. Since this was for a brown stock, not golden yoich, I defrosted the bones and roasted them some more until they turned golden brown.
For this batch I used my full sheet pan, rather than my half sheet pan. I also had a few bones left from a beef standing rib roast, and since this is to replace beef stock, I went ahead and added them as well.
The roasted bones added to my 10-quart Instant Pot. I left a well in the center for the aromatics.
The fond on the sheet pan after roasting and removing the bones.
On a half sheet pan I roasted most of my aromatics:
Onion with the skin left on for additional color
Carrots
and
Celery
I added the juices from the roasted aromatics to the fond, and used a splash of boiling water to scrape up all of the goodness. If I had an opened bottle of red wine, I would have used that instead.
The “cleaned” sheet pan after scraping up and pouring off the fond.
Liquid gold, in my opinion. I add half to each batch I make in the 10-quart IP.
Since I use the same bones for both batches, but use fresh roasted aromatics and chicken feet for each batch, I had to figure out a way to easily remove the spent aromatics from the bones before making a second batch. So, I have a half a dozen of flour sack towels I use for food processes only. These are laundered separately in food safe soap, and stored separately from my regular towels and linens.
In the flour sack towel I have chicken feet, the roasted vegetables, a couple cloves of peeled garlic, and some fresh thyme, dill, and flat leaf parsley.
I then tie the flour sack towel around the aromatics…
…and plop it into the well in the middle of the bones.
A splash of apple cider vinegar and a couple of tablespoons spoons of tomato paste, fill with water (I typically get five quarts in with this much solids in the insert), and we’re ready to pressure cook on Soup Low Pressure for four hours.
About six hours later (an hour to pressurize, fours hours cook time, and an hour to depressurize), the stock is ready for the initial strain.
(This is actually the second batch. I forgot to take a photo after the first batch)
The two batches combined after the initial strains to get the bones and aromatics out. They’re combined in a 12-quart stock pot to be refrigerated overnight to gelatinize.
There is still a lot of particulate in the stock, but further straining is to come before packaging.
After being refrigerated overnight, quite a bit of fat rises to the top, even though the stock is made from mostly bones.
Once the far is skimmed off, the stock appears beautifully gelatinous.
(I have a 3 second video of the gelatinous state, but I still don’t know how to insert a short video into a post on the Watch. It’s viewable on my post about this in the food thread on the discord)
I don’t own a chinois, so I improvise for the next strain by using my finest mesh strainer…
…and lining that with another flour sack towel.
To begin this second strain, I gently melt the stock on the stovetop back to a room temperature liquid state. I then pour some of the stock into the towel lined strainer and help it seep through to a container underneath.
The container I’m using in this strain only holds about three quarts, so I need do this step in batches. In between each batch I rinse out the flour sack towel, otherwise the accumulation of particulate slows the straining process down immensely.
In between each batch of the second strain, I start packaging each batch in two cups measure. I use my four cup fat separator to measure out the two cups, which has yet another fine mesh strainer built in for a third strain.
The stock must have been skimmed pretty well; there’s barely any fat at the top of the two cups.
I freeze my stocks in zipper freezer bags. To fill the bags I use a canning jar lifter to support the bags and hold them open.
Two cups of stock in a quart freezer bag is easily supported this way.
The bags are then laid flat on a half sheet pan and put into the freezer to harden.
Once frozen solid, I can fit four of the quarts size bags into a gallon zipper bag. I put a quarter sheet of a paper towel between each bag to help prevent any condensation from causing them to possibly stick together and tear when separating.
Then, into the chest freezer to be removed as needed.
I see french onion soup and mushroom barley soup in our near future!
