The Rubber Chicken

The Rubber Chicken comes from the Flylady's recipes. She describes herself as my "personal online coach to help you gain control of your house and home." I end up back at her site on a semi-annual basis and every time I think "hey, this could work." It hasn't yet, but maybe next time.

One of her big things is menu planning (which I do and can really say it reduces the amount of stress I have by 7.3%) and she has a pretty extensive collection of recipes on her site. One of them is the Rubber Chicken. The main reason I have never tried this is because I don't cook whole chickens.

Luckily, our local grocer does. I live a small rural town, but we have an AWESOME grocery store. We are truly blessed in that regard. They have an incredible deli that includes whole baked chickens that come in variety of spice flavors. During the school year, we have this for supper once a week.
It's that good.Once you have supper, tear off every last scrap of chicken off the bones. If DH is not home, we can not only have leftovers for another supper, but I can take my lunch the next day.
Once you have the bones picked clean, you probably are trying to decide whether or not the scraps can go in the garbage can. No, they cannot. We are not done with those yet!

Take the scraps and any juices in the bottom of the bag and dump them into a large stockpot. Do you know why these are called stockpots? It is because we are going to make chicken stock. Or broth. You know, for soup.
Cover that up with water. You can also add in some onion, salt, pepper, garlic, whatever you like to flavor with.
Cover and simmer that on low and get the kids in the tub. After about an hour or two, turn off the heat and let the pot cool. Now you can remove all the scraps and throw them out. I put them back in the bag the chicken came in.
By the time the pot has cooled down, it is probably bed time. This is perfect. Put the lid on the pot and stick it in the fridge. This will solidify any fat leftover and it will form a pretty disgusting looking layer on the top of the liquid.
Skim that off. There is no way you are going to get it all, so pour the broth through a strainer.
And you will be left with liquid gold.
Ziploc makes these three cup containers that are perfect to freeze broth. Pour it in and twist the cap on. It is also a good idea to label the container with the date you put it in the freezer. I usually forget to do this, especially if it is in the morning.
I use it up so fast it doesn't make much difference. You will also probably have one container that is not all the way full. That is fine because you can add to it next week when you get another chicken. Because now you are addicted.
To be continued...