I love to make soup, especially with delicious, homemade stock. Maybe you’re thinking – what’s so hard about throwing a bunch of stuff into a pot and letting it simmer? Nothing, it’s the process after the cooking that is tedious and time consuming. If you have never used a nut milk bag, it is going to change your life. Making soup stock just got so much easier.
What is a nut milk bag?
A nut milk bag is a fabric pouch that is traditionally used to strain raw nut milk. I recently discovered that they are perfect to throw all of your soup stock ingredients into and simmer away. I use tightly woven, unbleached, organic cotton bags. The ones I have can easily hold a whole chicken carcass or as shown on the left, a whole turkey breast. For a whole turkey, I use one bag for the main body and the another for the legs, thighs, wings and neck. And they are reusable, so one investment of about $5 should last a lifetime.
The Soup Stock Process
I put all of the ingredients into a nut bag. You can include any roasted bones, vegetables and seasonings that you would normally use to make stock. This works great without any animal bones as well. I like to keep it simple. For my everyday chicken stock, I put in the carcass from one roasted chicken, a few whole pepper corns and a bay leaf (1). Tie up the bag and toss it into a pot filled with water (2). Bring the water to a boil and then lower the temperature to simmer. I like to simmer all day if possible.
After the stock has simmered, that’s when the magic happens. I just pull out the bag (3), turn it inside out to dump the contents in the trash or compost (4). That’s it! No fishing bones or veggie bits out of scalding liquid or straining until every last peppercorn is found. Just pull the bag out and I’m done.
The stock can then go into the frig overnight or straight to processing.
Clean up
I leave the bag inside out and give it a quick hand scrub with regular dish soap. Leave the nut bag in a bowl of soapy water so it doesn’t dry out and become stained. I toss it in with the hot water laundry the next time I do a load. My bags are 100% cotton, so I hang them to dry. Turn it right side out and it’s ready for the next use.
Processing the finished soup stock
I tend to do two types of stock batches. Either a small batch in the crockpot which yields about 2 quarts or a large batch in the stock pot which yields about 7 quarts.
For small batches in a crockpot stock – once cooking is completed, then I will refrigerate overnight and skim the fat off. I like to use half for a soup right away and freeze the other half in a plastic freezer bag. I always freeze 4 cups ( one quart) so that there is no confusion when I pull stock out of the freezer.
For large batches in a stock pot – once cooking is completed, I pressure can six quart jars and save one in frig for immediate use. You could also freeze the stock if you have enough room in your freezer. I like to have some canned and some frozen for a variety of cooking options.
Soup Recipes
Enjoy some of my favorite soup recipes.
