Dale wrote:Chicken stock is really what I mean. Just liquid, not solids in it. But, I buy it in containers that are labelled chicken broth.
If I understand correctly, stock is made from bones and broth is made from meat. Here in Amerikay, anyway. Some guy on the Food Network said so, so naturally I buy that. "Saw it on TV and all" sort of thing, you know. Of course, if you're making a soup from stock, the stock colloquially gets called the broth once it's soup. Go figure.
Word to the wise: if you're making stock from fowl, don't boil the bones. Simmer them if you want the stock to be nice and clear, otherwise boiling makes for cloudy stock, and we don't like cloudy stock. Why this isn't an issue with other stocks is a mystery to me.
Yay! I learned that on Good Eats. Alton Brown is sexy.
Sorry. I saw an episode where he had his shirt off. All I can say is that the man either has a rock-solid ego, or very little of one at all.
"If you take music out of this world, you will have nothing but a ball of fire." - Balochi musician
Typically, in the grocery store you can buy canned or dehydrated "chicken broth", which is pretty flat flavored, made of chicken and water. It's pretty common.
A rarer find is "chicken stock", which is actually made with chicken bones and vegetables.
Chicken broth is pale yellow. Chicken stock is brown. I know "broth" and "stock" are supposed to mean essentially the same thing, but that's not the case in the grocery store.
This is the stock I most often see in stores:
(that's not my picture)
Here's a typical broth
To me, cans of chicken broth like this taste indistinguishable from chicken bullion.
you can clarify a cloudy stock with egg whites and egg shells. the stock should be at a bare simmer; gently slip the egg whites and shells on top of the stock. In a few minutes all that guck will stick to the egg whites and the sauce should clear up.
Gotten from Julia Child, I think... somewhere
PS the chowdah recipe is the same as mine that I stole from a book called "Cod". Really....
Actually, most chicken broth/stock that is sold as a powder is a bunch of chemicals that "taste like" chicken soup, but there is actually no chicken in it. If you're lucky, someone might have waved a rubber chicken over it, but that's about it. Tasty!
djm
I'd rather be atop the foothills than beneath them.
Over here everything that is used as a base for soup/sauce/etc is stock. To us Broth is a type of soup.
Answers.com has the following definition:
1)The water in which meat, fish, or vegetables have been boiled; stock.
2)A thin, clear soup based on stock, to which rice, barley, meat, or vegetables may be added.
3)A liquid containing nutrients for culturing microorganisms: “[They] grew bacteria in a small flask of broth” (Horace Freeland Judson).
Part of the definition of Stock from the same site:
The broth in which meat, fish, bones, or vegetables are simmered for a relatively long period, used as a base in preparing soup, gravy, or sauces.
So it seems broth is stock and stock is broth.
Now I'm really hungry and feel like cooking some good hearty broth like my mum makes.
Making your own chicken stock is a cinch and is so much better than anything you can buy in the store that there's no contest. I make 3 or 4 quarts at a time and freeze it in 2- or 4-cup-size containers. You can use it in soups or in place of water when cooking rice or vegetables...it's delicious. Our local butcher shop sells chicken bones with some meat still on them for way cheap -- 99 cents Canadian for about 4 pounds.
Take 3-4 pounds of chicken parts and/or bones
1 cup chopped onion (don't even bother to peel it)
1 cup chopped carrot
1/2 cup chopped celery
1 sprig of fresh thyme or a pinch of dried thyme
1/2 bay leaf
A few sprigs of fresh parsley
A teaspoon or more of salt
Four quarts of water
Put everything together in a stockpot, bring almost to a boil and then simmer, partially covered for at least 2 hours. Strain, refrigerate for a day, skim off any fat, then put in containers and freeze.
Another wonderful and simple stock is shrimp stock: if you buy shrimp with their shells on, don't throw the shells away...use them for this stock:
4 cups of shrimp shells (from about 2 pounds of shrimp)
1 tsp salt
4.5 cups of water
Combine everything in a saucepan, bring to a boil, then turn heat to low and cover. Cook for 15 minutes, cool, and strain. Keep in fridge for up to 2 days or freeze. This is good as the basis for any fish soup, shrimp soup, or garlic soup.
Also note that, in the US at least, almost all shrimp that you buy in the supermarket were sold to the market frozen and then thawed for sale, so you're best off buying frozen shrimp and thawing them yourself at home.
salt pork
So named because it is salt-cured, this is a layer of fat (usually with some streaks of lean) that is cut from the pig's belly and sides. Salt pork is often confused with fatback, which is unsalted. It varies in degree of saltiness and often must be blanched to extract excess salt before being used. It's similar to bacon but much fattier and unsmoked. Salt pork can be refrigerated tightly wrapped for up to a month. It's used primarily as a flavoring and is an important ingredient in many dishes throughout New England and the South.
salt pork
So named because it is salt-cured, this is a layer of fat (usually with some streaks of lean) that is cut from the pig's belly and sides. Salt pork is often confused with fatback, which is unsalted. It varies in degree of saltiness and often must be blanched to extract excess salt before being used. It's similar to bacon but much fattier and unsmoked. Salt pork can be refrigerated tightly wrapped for up to a month. It's used primarily as a flavoring and is an important ingredient in many dishes throughout New England and the South.
In the past, I believe, salt curing meat use to be done with more than just side and belly pork. Prior to and including the civil war salt pork was given out as a ration and it often the whole butchered pig that was salted not just the fatty sections. I often wonder what many of the older recipes tasted like with the older ingredients.
"Be not deceived by the sweet words of proverbial philosophy. Sugar of lead is a poison."
