Chicken for Canning
With chickens on sale at Kroger for 77¢/pound, I did a good bit of canning yesterday and this morning. Five chickens fills 14 quart jars of chicken in broth and 7 quarts of rich broth. All that for about $23. The chickens were cut up and the bones were left in, except for the breasts. They were boned and skinned. The bones and skins were not removed from the rest of the pieces. The raw chicken was placed in the jars. In a separate pot, I boiled the bones from the breasts, the backs and the extra skin, added onions, celery, carrots, a bit of salt and pepper. The broth was added to each jar and the leftover broth was canned separately.
Like most everything else, there are several ways to can chicken and broth. Some will debone the chicken, saying it’s a waste of space in the jar to have all those bones in there. That’s true but I think the bones give it some flavor and I’m not short on space so I don’t mess with removing the meat from the bones before canning. Since the on sale chickens were whole chickens, I didn’t want to take the time to remove the bones. If I came across a great deal on boneless, skinless chicken breasts, I’d buy them and can them too. For me, it’s all about how I will use the meat and the price.
With the broth, some will refrigerate it overnight, allow the fat to come to the top and harden, then skim it off before canning. There are recipes I make where I want the fat included . . dumplings or if I’m using the broth to make cornbread dressing. Sometimes, I will place a jar in the fridge, let the fat harden, remove it and use that to saute vegetables for something like gumbo or rice dressing, instead of using butter.
The canned chicken will fall off the bones while I’m attempting to get it out of the jar. It’s that tender! The meat will be used for any recipe that required boiling or cooking the chicken before using. Some recipes that come to mind are gumbo, chicken spaghetti, chicken & rice casserole, chicken & broccoli casserole, King Ranch casserole . . most any kind of chicken soup – chicken and noodles, chicken taco soup, chicken chili, etc. It obviously isn’t going to work for fried chicken or grilled chicken .. things like that but it’s quite nice to have a good many jars of home canned chicken and homemade broth sitting around!
Helen Koenig1 says
You are quite right – that the bones give added flavor. In fact, some of the BEST chicken soup I ever made was broth made from chicken backs and necks – which are almost completely (but NOT totally) bones. To that once I strained the bones from it, I would add chicken pieces, onions, spices. This made awesome soup – only surpassed when I had baked or broiled a chicken and added the drippings to the soup as well.
And yes – re the fat – for years I’ve used the fat that was in there to saute this and that – usually onions and garlic. Works quite nicely!
Sharon G says
lots of lusciousness there…YUM
Cookie E. says
Judy – Thanks for the valuable info. I’m going to check Amazon and see if I can get the USDA book ASAP.
Karin Vail says
I made turkey broth from our last Thanksgiving turkey, and then canned the broth – hubby said I was nuts and he thought I was wasting my time, LOL. He does NONE of the cooking though and didn’t understand how often I use broth of some sort – and canned homemade broth is so much better than bouillon cubes for soup starter!
Diane - FL says
question…does your canned chicken have the same texture as fresh chicken? I ask because I do not like the texture of store bought canned chicken and have always stayed away from home canning it because I didn’t want to do all the work and then hate the results. no one in my family ever canned meats so I have no one to ask but you…tag your it! 🙂 Thanks for all your great information.
Diana says
Thanks Judy. I was hoping you would do a post on how you can the chicken. You KNOW I will be doing this soon now! I make my own broth now too because of you! You are the best and I appreciate you!
Robin says
Did I understand you to say you put raw chicken in the jars? I obviously don’t do any canning but if it’s raw how foes it keep?
Rebecca in SoCal says
“It’s quite nice to have a good many jars of home canned chicken and homemade broth sitting around!” Quite an understatement, and especially if you are sick and don’t feel like cooking, and chicken is about the only thing you can eat! Not that that applies to you much; testament to your good life?
Bev Gunn says
When I saw the title my first thought was that one of the chickens had met its end and was going into the stew pot! But, no, you are buying dead chickens to can….oh, well, one day you may have enough at home to be doing a batch!