Preserving Chicken Stock is a smart way to minimize waste and always have a tasty flavorful base for soups, stews and sauces. You start with a large batch of your own homemade chicken stock and that couldn't be easier, really!
How To Pressure Can Chicken Stock
To preserve chicken stock for future use, you'll want to pressure can it or freeze it. This post reviews how to pressure can the chicken stock and how to freeze chicken stock.
Having homemade chicken stock on hand not only adds depth and richness to your dishes but it also reduces food waste and saves money by utilizing leftover ingredients.
Preserving chicken stock is EASY!
There are two main methods that I use.
Freezing:
- Pour the chicken stock you have into labeled zippered plastic freezer bags, remove as much air as possible from the bag and make sure it is sealed well.
- Then lay gently in a flat position in the freezer (so that it freezes flat and is easy to stack).
- Allow to freeze.
- Thaw and use when needed.
- You can also freeze some in ice cube trays so that you have small amounts of stock when needed as well. Just put your cubes in a zipper freezer bag and BAM they are ready to use!
Pressure Canning: This does require a pressure canner, jars and some other equipment, but if you are a canner – you already know about those equipment needs.
Here's What You'll Need
- Your chicken stock.
- Clean quart jars.
- Bands
- Lids
- Sauce pan
- Pressure canner
- Canning tools like jar lifter, magnet, etc.
Here's How You Do It
- Ladel the stock into hot jars. Place the lid securely.
- Place into the pressure canner and fill with water about 25% of the way up the jars.
- Pressure can under 10lb pressure for 25 minutes.
- Allow to come back to room temperature. Keep out of drafts while cooling.
Tips and Tricks
- You'll find that sometimes there is sediment in your stock, this won't hurt anything, it's just pieces of veggies and meat that didn't get strained out. To get a cleaner stock, barely simmer when making, ladel off the top and strain as well as you can.
- If a jar doesn't seal, keep the stock refrigerated and use within 3 days.
- It is fine to reprocess the jar with a new lid if it doesn't seal.
- Always wipe the jar lid well to help seal the jar well.
PRO TIP: Always keep a freezer bag in the freezer and put all of your celery tops, carrot tops, onion tops, chicken wing tips, etc. for making a delcious chicken stock at any time.
Storage, Keeping and Reheating
Chicken stock properly pressure canned will last for a year.
Frozen chicken stock will last for 6 months.
Refrigerated Chicken Stock will keep in the fridge for 3-5 days.
Reheat chicken stock in a saucepan on the stovetop or in one minute intervals in the microwave in a microwave safe dish.
Watch Me Make This
I hope you'll join me over on social media to show me some photos of your beautiful preserved chicken stock! How did you make yours? What did you do differently?
I hope you'll leave me some comments below, I LOVE to hear from you and I answer all of your comments just as quickly as I possibly can!
Preserving Chicken Stock
Ingredients
- 2 gallons Chicken stock or use your own recipe
- Quart or Pint sized canning jars
- Lids
- Rings
Instructions
- Prepare the weighted – guage pressure canner, jars and lids for 30 minutes before the stock is ready.
- Ladle the hot stock into hot jars leaving 1 inch of head space. Wipe the rim with a wet paper towel. Center the lid on the jar, screw the band on to finger tip tight.
- Place the jars in the canner. Adjust the water level, lock the lid and bring to a boil over medium high heat. Vent the steam for 10 minutes. Close the vent. Continue heating to 10lbs of pressure. Process pint jars for 20 mins and quart jars for 25 mins.
- Turn off the heat, let the pressure return to 0. Wait another 2 minutes then you may open the vent. Remove the canner lid. Wait for 10 minutes and then remove the jars, cool and store.
Notes
- You'll find that sometimes there is sediment in your stock, this won't hurt anything, it's just pieces of veggies and meat that didn't get strained out. To get a cleaner stock, barely simmer when making, ladel off the top and strain as well as you can.
- If a jar doesn't seal, keep the stock refrigerated and use within 3 days.
- It is fine to reprocess the jar with a new lid if it doesn't seal.
- Always wipe the jar lid well to help seal the jar well.
Nutrition
This post has been entirely updated from it's original format that was posted on December 16, 2014 including the recipe card.
In case you were wondering.
Thessalonians 2:3
Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of [b]sin is revealed, the son of perdition.
Val says
So about 2 weeks ago I cooked chicken stock (to reduce the liquid) and filled a pint jar about 3/4 full. Caped it and it sealed. I did not pressure can it. Does that mean this is spoiled by now.
Wendi Spraker says
It's a great question but it's hard to know from here, at two weeks, it's getting risky. I guess you could go by smell, but I wouldn't take that chance and don't think you should either.
Moxie says
So simple