Prep | Killer Noms

Basic Brown Stock

This simple brown stock recipe works with bones and meat from pretty much any type of seafood, game, poultry, or livestock. Click here for a deeper dive into stockmaking.

Brining improves flavor, reduces toughness, and adds moisture. Most meats benefit – but lean, tough meats (like game) benefit most of all.For wild birds brining opens up vast cooking options that otherwise may produce dry, tough meat.

Cocktail Sauce

It’s sad that many restaurants no longer accompany shellfish like shrimp and crab with this iconic American dipping sauce. Nowadays what they bring seems bland and sort of pointless, completely lacking “zing”. Yeah, I get it. Shellfish flesh has a delicate flavor. And there Read More …

Poultry Stock

Of course this works best with wild birds like turkey, pheasant — or even a big mess of quail. PLEASE do not just “breast ’em out” and toss the rest — all those bones and meat are a first-class ticket to great stock!

Preparing Poultry for Stock

When boning out whole processed grocery store chickens, the weight ratio if what you are left with (after subtracting giblets & neck if included) will be about 52% boneless meat, 20% skin and 28% bones.

So, for instance, to wind up with 12 lbs of bones you may need over 40 lbs of poultry.

Game birds may have different ratios, but not dramatically so. You may just have to keep track – and if you have too little for the size batch you want, you can always supplement with chicken.

Whether wild or store-bought, save the skins! Roasted and crumbled into the stockpot they add tremendous flavor. And for commercial chickens or turkeys, it lets you harvest much of the fat. Of course with wild birds that means you need to do a thorough plucking job… which can be a big hassle.

Normally the limiting factor for the number of “Servings” is either the weight of bones you have available, or the capacity of your stock pot.

So fiddle with the pot size below until you come up with a number that is both a) not bigger than your biggest pot and b) not more bones than you expect to use. All of the other ingredients will fall into line.

Some of the boned meat will be called for in the stock recipe. It will be mostly leg meat, wings and if necessary some of the boneless thighs or breasts – depending what you prefer to keep for other purposes.

If starting with whole birds you’re likely to have a lot of boneless meat left over – plan in advance for how you want to use it. When I’m done processing the birds, I salt the extra meat as if dry-brining (google it), then vacuum seal in meal-size packages and freeze. It will partially dry-brine as it freezes, then the process completes when thawed for cooking. It’s super convenient – and dry-brined poultry is outstanding (adjust your recipes to accommodate the salt that is already in the meat). It’s more chicken than I normally need to have handy, so I share it with friends, neighbors or relatives.

Some stock recipes (including mine here) call for adding chicken feet for body. I always do that, but it becomes extra important if you are saving the chicken wings for other purposes (om nom nom). Even though the wings are great for stock, I usually do the freezer dry-brining trick in quantities of a dozen or so.