Slow Cooker Chicken Broth

Homemade chicken broth is easy.  Eeeaaasy!  Especially if you have a slow cooker. 

It's also cheeeap if you have leftover chicken bits and bones from a roast chicken.  I used the bits and bones from a store-bought rotisserie chicken. 

I'm a bit picky about my chicken broth; I only buy the kind that is sodium-free and has reduced-fat.  Unfortunately, that's also the expensive kind at the grocery store.  (Which brings me to my perennial question: Why is healthy food more expensive?? If it's good for you, then it should be cheaper, yes?)  So I decided to make my own. 

The prep work is non-existent if you use frozen, pre-sliced/chopped veggies.  It's still very fast if you roughly chop fresh vegetables.  After cooking, I strain out the solids and refrigerate the broth overnight.  Skim off the solidified fat in the morning and ta-da... Homemade, sodium-free, reduced-fat chicken broth!

The broth is a lovely caramel color and it is great for use in other soups, sauces, and to make couscous.  I used it in my Potato-Artichoke Soup.  I recommend using it Beverly's Parsnip Soup, Chicken And Couscous, and Cuban-style Red Kidney Beans.

Slow Cooker Chicken Broth
From Allrecipes.com
Makes 5-6 cups

Ingredients:

Carcass of one chicken (including skin and gristle--anything you didn't eat!)
2 carrots, roughly chopped (or 2 cups of frozen, sliced carrots)
1 stalk of celery, sliced*
1 onion, roughly chopped (or 1 1/2 cups frozen, chopped onions)
1 tbsp dried oregano
6 cups of water

Directions: Put all ingredients into a large slow cooker and cover.  Set the heat to low and cook for 8 hours.

*Note: Leftover celery freezes well!

A note regarding the nutrition information: I didn't include it for this recipe because it was simply too difficult to figure it out using the recipe calculator at Sparkpeople.com.  The nutrition information on Allrecipes.com doesn't sound right--there's too much protein.  I do think that this is comparable to a store bought sodium-free, reduced fat chicken broth.