Friday, July 23, 2010

High Country Housewife Tips

Can’t take credit for this one. My sister Kate who is also crafty in the kitchen showed me this the other day when she was making chicken pot pies. Can’t Kate's Wedding 015_800 believe I never thought of it before.
--Save all of your veggie cast offs that you would normally throw away or compost (onion and carrot and celery stubs, herb stems, rinds of lemons/oranges, the ends of peppers etc.). Put them in a zip lock bag in the fridge and then whenever you stew a chicken throw all of it in the pot of water with it.
When you’re done cooking the chicken, take it out, put it to the side and strain everything left in the pot (in a normal colander) and you’ve got great already seasoned broth to either make soup with or add into a rue sauce for casseroles, pies etc. (I would try to cycle weekly with this though, you don’t want it to get too burly). Also if you want the broth to be lower in fat you can pop it in the fridge for a while and skim the fat off of the top with a spoon.
I know I usually stew a chicken or some split breasts at least once a week September Oakland 038_600 and then make an assortment of things with it. It’s one of the smartest and easiest things that you can do on a budget and with all of the great local produce that you can find in the Boone and Blowing Rock areas, you might as well have fun with the variety of vegetables knowing you’ll get double usage out of them.
Maybe my next post will be about easy and cheap ways to use stewed chicken.
As always, thanks for reading and please feel free to contact me directly if you have things you’d like to read about!