I got the recipe and idea from David Changs Cooking At Home book. The idea is to boil a while chicken in just salted water to cook the chicken. Then the liquid is cooked further to make a great broth and the boiled chicken is cooked nicely and can be shredded and used for soup, chicken salad, or anything else. The broth had great flavor even when just bay leaf, onion, carrots, salt, pepper were added. I could not find a whole chicken and instead used thighs with bones and skin. I found the broth was great just by adding the skin. May get additional flavor by adding the bones after meat is removed. I may prefer the thighs to whole chicken since easier to work with.
Ingredients
- small whole chicken or 2-3 pounds of bone-in with skin chicken thighs
- salt, pepper
- 2 bay leafs
- rough chopped onion, carrots, celery
Steps
- in large pot place whole chicken or chicken thighs, try to lie them flat
- add water until about 1 inch above the chicken
- add few teaspoons to 1 tablespoon salt to water
- turn on heat until boiling
- turn down to easy boil, simmer cook for 40m
- remove chicken from pot, using tongs and fork remove skin then shred the chicken
- add skin back to pot, and the bones
- add salt, pepper to taste
- add about 2 bay leafs
- add carrots, onions, celery or if making soup can add later
- cook for another 40m
- strain broth
- cool in fridge, when cools can skim fat off top
to make basic soup
- add broth in pot bring to simmer
- add sliced carrots and celery
- add shredded chicken
- add pasta (if uncooked add early, if cooked add few minutes)
- add herbs like thyme
- cook until vegetables are soft
