Boiled Chicken

This is a great basic recipe for boiled chicken.  It's so easy because there's not much prep involved.  My grocery store has whole chickens on sale for $.77/lb. about once a month, so I stock up my freezer.  I use boiled chicken for all kinds of casseroles and dishes, and as a bonus, I get several cups of chicken stock that I freeze for later use.


Boiled Chicken

Adapted from this recipe on Allrecipes.com

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time:  1 hour 30 minutes
Serves: 8

Ingredients:

• 1 (3 pound) whole chicken
• 1 large onion, halved
• 3 carrots, cut into chunks 
• 2 stalks of celery, cut into chunks
• 2 whole cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp. salt
• 1 tbsp. whole peppercorns

Directions:

1. Remove any giblets from inside the chicken.  Rinse the whole chicken well.
2. Place chicken in a large pot along with the onion, carrots, celery, garlic, salt and peppercorns.  Add water to cover.  
3. Cover pot and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to a gentle boil and cook for about 1 1/2 hours, or until meat is falling off the bone.  
4. Remove chicken, cool and remove meat from the bone. 
5. If desired, strain broth, cool and freeze for later use.

Notes & Suggestions:

Usually the chickens I buy are 4-5 lbs. so I just add 1 extra carrot, celery stalk and clove of garlic, along with an extra 1/2 tbsp. salt.   

This recipe also works well if you just want to boil chicken breasts or thighs and not a whole chicken.  

A hint - to ensure your chicken stays juicy and doesn't dry out, cool it in the broth before picking the meat off the bones.  

I usually measure out the chicken broth in 1 cup portions and then freeze either in small containers or Ziplocs. Then whenever a recipe calls for chicken broth, I defrost whatever I need.  It has so much more flavor than the box stuff.