The weather this spring has been dreary, to put it mildly. Almost every day has been rain, clouds, and more rain. It’s about time we shared a secret that has helped us get through it.

All the dreariness has put us in the mood for many more batches of Pressure Cooker Chili (I just don’t think I’ll tire of the stuff) and for homemade chicken Soup.

Homemade chicken soup is best when made with homemade chicken stock from the bones of a roasted chicken, which we just happened to have from a delicious dinner I made over the weekend.

Normally roasting a chicken takes all day, and then making stock takes all of another day. “Phew!”… It’s delicious, but certainly not cut out for a quick weekday meal plan. When I found a pressure cooker recipe that made stock in half an hour, I knew I had to try it. I was excited to see how pressure blasting the vegetables in the stock would enhance the flavor, and I wasn’t let down with the resulting robust homemade chicken stock.

“What is a soup kitchen?” - Paris Hilton

Instead of spending all afternoon making this soup, I was able to spend about 1 hour (including cook time) and came out with what was voted by Ryan (and me!) as the best tasting soup I’ve made to date.

How to make chicken stock:
Making this stock is so easy. All you need are:

1 carcass and bones of a small chicken (about 3lbs), most meat removed and set aside for the soup (or eaten for last night dinner!)
8 cups of water
1 large onion, loosely chopped
2 large stalks of celery, loosely chopped
2 medium carrots, loosely chopped
1 Tbl dried parsley, or 1 bunch fresh
1tsp dried thyme, or 4 sprigs fresh
½ tsp dried minced garlic, or 1 large fresh clove
1 tsp whole peppercorns
2 bay leaves

Step 1: Add the ingredients and water

First you want to dump the chicken bones in the pressure cooker and cover with the full 8 cups of water. I found that some of the ribcage stuck up above the water, so I ripped the bones into smaller pieces to get them more covered.

Then add everything else: all the spices, the chopped onion, carrots, celery, and bay leaves. Feel free to use good veggies that may now be less than perfect for this portion – you will be straining them out later, so it’s a good time to use up what’s in the fridge.

Step 2: Boil

Bring the whole pot to a boil and skim off any foam before putting the lid on the pressure cooker.

Step 3: Pressure Cook

After removing the foam, bring the pressure cooker to pressure for 30 minutes.

After the time is up, remove the pressure cooker from the heat and follow instructions for the natural release method.

Step 4: Strain

After cooling to equal pressure, open the lid (away from you), pour the stock through a strainer to remove the bones and obliterated vegetables. You should be left with delicious yellow stock.

*NOTE: Feel free to change the proportions of spices, or add and remove them to match your favorite stock recipe; the principle idea and timing will always be the same.

Step 5: Make your soup

When the stock is done all you have left to do is make soup! I usually pick off any remaining meat from the strained bones, as well as adding back some of the larger pieces of meat that I had taken off before cooking the stock. Besides meat, we love soup with a ton of veggies: another whole onion (diced), 4-6 whole carrots (diced), 3-4 celery stalks (diced), more freshly ground black pepper, a dash of salt, a few dashes of paprika, and a few more shakes of parsley. I do most of it to taste, without measurements. Bring the whole thing to a boil until the vegetables are cooked through and ready to eat.

Here is our official pressure cooker homemade chicken soup recipe.

You can also add noodles, rice, and any other vegetables you think would be delicious. In the past I’ve added turnips, parsnips, even spinach, and they’ve all been great.

Nothing like good old comfort food on a dreary and rainy day…

Looking for the non pressure cooker 8 hour chicken stock recipe?
Nothing beats Alton Brown’s.