Homemade Chicken Broth in a Crockpot

Nourishing Bone Broth

With our first week of cool mornings, it's starting to feel like fall again. Friday night football, fall festivals and big, warm bowls of homemade chicken noodle soup. I'm getting ready for soup season (as well as flu season) by stocking the freezer with nourishing bone broth.

Following this recipe for slow cooker chicken broth, I added the bones and necks of two whole, pastured chickens, onion pieces and skins (gives the broth a nice yellow color), carrots and celery stalks and leaves to my 6 quart crockpot. Left to cook in the crockpot all day, the house was filled with a wonderful aroma. Even after the broth cooled, it still smelled heavenly! As if you were about to dive into a big bowl of chicken noodle soup. My crockpot yielded 3 quarts of stock - 2 cups of which I set aside in the refrigerator for lentil chili later in the week. The rest is now in the freezer.

Tip: I picked this tip up from Stephanie at Keeper of the Home. When cutting onions, place cuttings and skins in a bag in the freezer. Then when you're making broth, toss some of the frozen pieces in. A wonderful way to let nothing go to waste!