After I serve roast chicken I like to hold on to the left over bones, skin and any bits of meat that won’t get used and either freeze it all in a bag or pop it into the fridge to make stock from later on. The slower and longer you boil the ingredients for, the richer the stock becomes so a slow cooker is perfect! I’ve left it for up to 24hrs in the past- so nice to be able to just let it do its thing while I’m sleeping! (Or should I say- while I’m up and down trying to get the baby back to sleep all night!!)

I tend to wait until I have 2 carcasses to use and put them in the bigger slow cooker but you can easily do this with just one.

Ingredients-

Bones, skin and left over parts of 2 roast chickens (one was frozen, one fresh)

2-3 carrots

2-3 onions

5-6 sticks of celery

4-5 cloves of garlic

2 bay leaves

Any other left over herbs you have (I threw in some parsley stalks)

Put the chicken carcasses in the slow cooker. I had one fresh and one frozen- no need to defrost it! Add the bay leaves.

Peel the onions and cut into quarters. Add to the pot 

Chop the celery into large chunks and add to the pot

Peel the garlic and cut each clove in half. Add to the pot

Don’t even bother peeling the carrots- just cut into large chunks and add to the pot!

Make sure everything is spread out. Add any other herbs you have.

Pour over water (I tend to use boiled but cold is fine) until it covers everything in the pot

Just like this! Now set the slow cooker to low and cook for at least 8 hours and up to 24 hours. I like to throw mine in after dinner and leave it until breakfast the following day!

So- the next day! But by bit spoon the solid ingredients into a sieve set over a large bowl and gently squash them to release the moisture before throwing away the dry remains. Pour the remaining liquid through the seive too.

You’ll be left with a lovely big bowl of stock! Some people like to add salt here but I prefer to add the salt during cooking instead.

Put the stock into containers and chill. Then you can either keep it in the fridge for 4 days or freeze it! Before freezing (or before using from the fridge) you’ll notice a thin layer of fat sitting on top- use a spoon to skim that off.