Creating the perfect stock takes time, but the good news is that it requires little supervision. Fowl hunters are often blessed with an abundance of bird carcasses ideal for building stock, which is often mistakenly called broth. However, the stock is technically made from bones and broth from meat. Big game hunters can use trimmed legs, necks, or even rib bones with little meat for a proper stock. The basic ingredients are bones, bird skin, some meat, and connective tissue, and you can include carrots, onions, celery, fresh herbs, and a pinch of salt.

Cover the carcasses or bones with water in a large stockpot. The trick to the perfect stock is to never let it boil or roll on the surface. A hard boil will cause the stock to become cloudy as fat and proteins emulsify into the liquid. Start the pot with bones on low heat. Simmer for a couple of hours, during which the stock is steaming, and the water is moving but not rolling. Skim the top of any foam created by proteins. Now is the time to add vegetables, salt, herbs, and a bay leaf or two. When finished and cooled, a good stock will have a layer of fat on top of the liquid. It can be skimmed off once the pot is cooled to have clear, flavourful stock.

Cooking for an event at the Taber Pheasant Festival provided a dozen wonderful-looking pheasant carcasses with the meat trimmed off. There was no way the carcasses would get tossed anywhere but into an extra-large stockpot for a slow simmer. Here is how we built an exquisitely rich pheasant stock.

Ingredients:

• Bones (Trimmed legs, necks, or rib with little meat)
• Bird skin
• Some meat
• Connective tissue
• Carrots
• Onions
• Celery
• Fresh herbs of your choice
• Bay leaves
• Pinch of salt

Directions:

Steps to build stock

1. Trim the meat from the bones and cartilage of a bird.
2. Cover the bones in cold water.
3. Heat the water slowly until steaming and wiggling but not rolling.
4. After an hour or two, skim the foam from the surface.
5. Bring the pot back to a slow simmer.
6. Add vegetables, herbs, bay leaves, and salt.
7. Simmer down the liquid to ¾ of the pot.
8. Strain the stock of any bones, vegetables, herbs, and bay leaves.
9. Cool and remove any fat from the surface with a slotted spoon.

Note: always simmer a stock with the lid off to allow evaporating liquids to escape.

Use the stock to add flavour to cooking, from soups to saucy stir fries. The stock can be pressure canned or frozen for future use.

More flavour

When the pheasant stock was almost complete, it was simmered longer until the liquid was reduced by half. When cooled, it turned into a gel. Reduced stock that has gelled is called consommé, which is loaded with flavour and has many uses. It can be served cold and is a common ingredient in aspic or natural gelatin dishes. It can also be added to soup, stew, or stir fry as a condensed stock to build flavours. The consommé is like a concentrated stock to add to any recipe. Freeze the gel in small cubes or one-cup portions for future use.