On a recent trip to the grocery store I found 10lb packages of chicken quarters (these are the leg/thigh pieces) on sale for an exceptionally good price. I bought 3 packages of them. I put two in the freezer and cooked up the remaining package into meal starters. A meal starter is simply something that has been prepared ahead of time to make your cooking time go smoother and more quickly.
This month I thought I would share some basic info and recipes on how and what to do with a bulk amount of chicken.
There are a couple of different ways you can cook the chicken. I have put all the chicken into a roasting pan with chopped up veggies, covered it with a lid or foil and then let this cook for several hours at about 325 degrees.
The easiest way and my most common method is to simply boil it. Doing it this way means you will end up with some yummy chicken broth.
To boil the chicken you will need to put the chicken into a large pot or even two smaller pots if you don’t have one big enough to hold all the chicken. Cover this with water and about 1 tablespoon of salt and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat, cover the pot with a lid and let this simmer for several hours; until the meat is falling off the bone. If you want more flavorful broth you can add a chopped up onion, chopped up carrot and even some garlic to the broth.
When the chicken has finished cooking you can use a slotted spoon and fork to fish out the meat. I then strain the broth through a colander into another bowl to make sure I get all the meat and bone pieces as well as catching any of the veggies I may have added. Those veggies are added for flavor and can be tossed at this point.
Let the chicken meat cool. As soon as it is cool enough to handle begin removing the meat from the bones. You will now have a large bowl full of chicken meat pieces. I then cut the chicken meat into small pieces.
Now the meat can be frozen for meat starters. I freeze about 2 cups of chopped chicken each in quart size freezer bags. Label the bag with the contents, the date and how much chicken is in the bag. This will help later on when you need it.
For the chicken broth, I put this in the refrigerator overnight so the fat can congeal on the top. The next day I remove the fat and divide the broth into freezer bags. I put about 2 cups in each bag. This can be used in recipes calling for 1 can of chicken broth.