Dutch Oven Chicken Broth

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Put those chicken backs, wings, and necks to good use and make a flavorful and nourishing Dutch oven chicken broth! This simple hands-off recipe is easy to make with chicken scraps and a few basic staples. It makes a delicious addition to rice, soup, gravy, and more!

Three jars of homemade chicken broth on a blue towel.

Soup season is here, and that means so is homemade broth season!

I’m certainly not opposed to buying cartons of broth, but a fresh homemade broth is such a delicious addition to a recipe, and it uses up food scraps!

I pretty much always have a few chicken backs sitting in my freezer waiting to get used up.

They do have a little bit of meat, so I try to use them in recipes whenever I can. But sometimes I get lazy and just make broth with them instead!

It’s a great way to use up chicken backs, or any cut of chicken that has a lot of bones and not much meat. That way, you’re still getting the flavor, nutrients, and protein out of the chicken without having to spend a long time getting the meat off of the bones!

Homemade broth is one of my favorite things to make anyway. Whether it’s this chicken broth, oxtail broth, or pork bone broth.

If you’ve got a lot of chicken backs on hand, it’s honestly one of the best ways to use them up. Trust me, your homemade soups will taste better than ever!

Why You'll Love This Recipe
Ingredients
How to Make Dutch Oven Chicken Broth
Tips + Notes
Storage and Freezing
Uses for Homemade Chicken Broth
Recipe FAQs
Related Recipes
Dutch Oven Chicken Broth

Why You’ll Love This Recipe

Use up food scraps: This recipe is such a great way to use chicken backs and veggies that are past their prime but still edible!
Hands-off recipe: 15 minutes of prep to get the broth started, and straining it at the end is all it takes! The rest of the time, you can relax while it gently simmers on the stove.
Great for freezing: Even if you make more broth than you need right away, homemade stock is a useful ingredient to keep on hand in your freezer!

Ingredients

Chicken backs: I prefer to use chicken backs for this because I often have a lot of them and they are full of bones. Wings and necks also work great!
Aromatics: Carrots, celery, onion, garlic, and parsley add a lot of delicious flavor to the stock. You can also take this opportunity to use up some of the wilted carrots and celery that have been tossing around your fridge!
Apple cider vinegar: This helps break down the cartilage, tendons, and bones, and brightens up the flavor of the broth.

Find the full list of ingredients with their measurements in the recipe card below!

How to Make Dutch Oven Chicken Broth

Chicken broth ingredients in a pot with water.

Step 1. Add the chicken backs, onion, carrots, celery, minced garlic, parsley, vinegar, bay leaf, salt, and pepper to a large Dutch oven. Pour in the water to cover by about 1 inch.

Chicken broth ingredients after being simmered for 3 hours.

Step 2. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Cover, reduce the heat to low, and simmer for 3 hours.

Step 3. Strain through a fine mesh strainer and discard the bones and vegetables.

Three jars of chicken broth on a blue towel.

Step 4. Cool, then refrigerate or freeze.

Tips + Notes

Chicken backs are full of bones, which is exactly what you want for broth. Chicken wings or necks work too, or a mix of all three!
No need to peel the vegetables; they all get strained out at the end. Just make sure you wash any dirt off of them.
Keep the salt light so you can season whatever you make with the broth later. If you are making it to sip on, add more salt to taste after it’s done simmering.
I let the broth cool for a bit before it goes in the fridge, but don’t leave it sitting out more than 2 hours.
Make sure your chicken stock stays at a gentle simmer; you don’t want a rapid simmer or a boil.

Storage and Freezing

Once your broth is cool, you can transfer it to the fridge until you’re ready to use it. It’ll keep in the fridge for about 4 days, or you can freeze it for up to 6 months.

To freeze broth, I recommend keeping it in the fridge overnight first so it is nice and cold. You can freeze broth in mason jars, silicone freezer trays, or plastic freezer bags. I freeze mine in zippered freezer bags, and they’ll stack nicely if you lay them flat to freeze.

If you opt to freeze the broth in jars, be sure to leave a lot of headspace — underfill them by several inches — so the broth can expand in the freezer without breaking your jars.

Uses for Homemade Chicken Broth

Simply put, you can use homemade broth for any recipe that calls for broth! Whether it’s a casserole, stuffing, chili, or skillet meal, you can use homemade instead of broth from a carton.

Using chicken broth to cook grains is also tasty! Use it in place of water in your quinoa, farro, or Dutch oven rice.

The most common way to use homemade chicken stock is, of course, in soup! It adds such a rich, delicious flavor to soups and chili. Try it in one of these cozy soup recipes:

Recipe FAQs

Can I make this in a slow cooker?

Yes, you can. Add the ingredients to the slow cooker and turn it on low. Let it simmer for at least 12 hours, then strain according to the directions.

Can I use vegetable scraps?

Yep! If you have onion and celery ends and carrot peels you’ve saved, you can absolutely use those instead of whole veggies. Just aim for a similar volume as the recipe calls for. It may take a while to save up that many scraps, so you can freeze them until you’re ready to make broth.

If you tried this Dutch Oven Chicken Broth or any other recipe on my website, please leave a star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. Thanks for visiting!