How To Make The Broth Transparent If It Is Cloudy Or Cook It Correctly, Including Chicken

2024 Author: Bailey Albertson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 12:53

How to make the broth transparent: the secrets of making the perfect soup

A properly cooked broth is aerobatics in cooking. The quality of the finished soup, sauce or aspic cooked on it depends on it. And the fish or meat broth itself is already an independent dish. It can be served with croutons, pies, or by adding a boiled egg. Unfortunately, sometimes the broth becomes cloudy and loses its appetizing appearance. What to do in this case? How to make the broth clear again?

Content

• 1 What determines the transparency of the broth

• 2 How to make clear broth for poultry, meat or fish soup

  • 2.1 How to cook chicken or breast broth
  • 2.2 Basis for beef or pork soup
  • 2.3 How to make a delicious fish broth
  • 2.4 Basis for jellied meat and aspic
• 3 How to lighten cloudy fish, chicken or meat broth
• 4 Video: how to cook a transparent broth - a master class from the chef Ilya Lazerson

What determines the transparency of the broth

In many ways, from the products from which it is prepared

1. The fattier the meat, the more likely the broth will turn out cloudy. During cooking, fats pass into a liquid and form an emulsion with it. The longer the broth is cooked, the more likely the fats will break down into fatty acids and glycerin, and the broth will become cloudy.
2. Broth is often cloudy from thawed meat than from fresh meat. When defrosting, the meat loses juices, which pass into water during cooking. The broth becomes more nutritious and saturated, but some of the proteins curl up, forming a foam, which causes a loss of transparency.
3. If the water boils strongly during cooking, the broth, even from chicken breast, is guaranteed to turn out cloudy. When boiling, small drops of fat and protein flakes are mixed, which form an emulsion and make the broth cloudy.
4. It is important when boiling to remove all floating foam until it stops forming. Otherwise, the broth will become cloudy.

The fat content of the meat used for cooking affects the clarity of the broth

The quality of meat or fish does not always depend on us, but proper preparation to achieve maximum transparency is in our hands. For this, it is useful to know some rules:

1. Before cooking, the food must be thoroughly washed with cold water, there should be no blood left on it.
2. Food should be placed in cold water if the goal is to cook broth rather than meat. So everything valuable will gradually pass from meat to liquid and the broth will turn out to be tastier and richer. If the meat is placed in hot water, the proteins on the surface will curl up, the pores will close and everything of value will remain in the meat. Which is good for meat, but bad for broth.
3. Bring the water to a boil with strong heat, reduce to low, after removing the foam, cook at minimum. The water should not boil, but only sway.
4. We only cover the pan with a lid, but not tightly, otherwise the broth will begin to boil and lose transparency.
5. After boiling, remove all the foam. We do this until it forms. Most sources advise doing this with a slotted spoon, but preferably with a spoon, it turns out cleaner. It is also advisable to remove excess fat.

How to make clear broth for poultry, meat, or fish soup

To cook a transparent broth, you need to know some rules and strictly follow the instructions.

1. Prepare the products: we cut the meat into small pieces, the bones - we clean, chop, we get rid of the gills and eyes from the fish heads, we also chop the big heads. The chicken can be put in whole.

   

   You can not cut the chicken for the broth, but cook it whole

2. I wash the products thoroughly, but do not squeeze them so that they do not lose juices.

   

   To prepare the broth, fill the food with cold water

3. Bring to a boil over high heat under a tightly closed lid.

   

   To prevent the broth from being cloudy, you need to remove all the foam.

4. Pour in a spoonful of cold water, after boiling, remove the floating foam. We repeat three times.
5. We reduce the heating to the minimum, open the lid slightly or remove it completely. Remove foam and fat from time to time.

6. Put the roots and vegetables and, if necessary, salt: chicken broth - 15–20 minutes, meat broth - 30 minutes before the end of cooking, put salt in fish broth immediately after boiling.

   

   Vegetables and roots will make the broth more tasty and flavorful.

7. We put seasonings and herbs. For broths they make "a bouquet of garni".
8. Cook until tender. You can determine the readiness of the meat. To do this, pierce the thickest edge with a chef's needle or just a fork. If they come in easily, the meat is done.

9. Take out the meat, discard the vegetables, filter the broth through a fine sieve or cheesecloth in 2-3 additions.

   

   Chicken and egg broth is a tasty and healthy dish

Garni's bouquet is a spicy herb for cooking broth, tied with a thread

For small seasonings like peppercorns, you can make a knot of cheesecloth or a wide bandage and dip it into the pot. If you are straining the broth, you can put the seasonings directly into the saucepan, then they will remain on the sieve.

To make the broth even more transparent, after boiling, you can cook the dish for 15 minutes, drain the water, wash the meat and dishes again, refill with cold water and cook as described above. It is believed that in this way you will get rid of all harmful substances and antibiotics contained in products. A controversial statement, since in the first 20 minutes most of the nutrients also pass into the broth.

How to cook chicken or breast broth

Cooking time depends on the age of the bird and the size of the piece, from 40 minutes to 2 hours. If a diet broth is being prepared, it is recommended to remove the skin, it contains a lot of fat. If you cook broth with giblets, do not put the liver, it will give a peculiar taste and may cause the broth to cloud.

Basis for beef or pork soup

It is advisable to take meat with a bone. Pitted broth is like a song without accompaniment. Okay, but something's missing. You can also cook bone broth, without meat. The bones are pre-chopped into pieces, the tubular ones are cooked whole. Wash prepared products, clean bones. Beef broth is cooked for 3 hours, pork broth - 2 hours, bone broth - 4-5 hours. Salt is added 30 minutes before the end of cooking, then roots and herbs are added.

How to make a delicious fish broth

The fish broth is cooked no longer than 40 minutes; it is recommended to salt it at the beginning of cooking.

A well-cooked broth must be transparent, with glistens of fat on the surface.

Carrots, onions, celery and parsley root are put in meat and chicken broths, onions and parsley are put in fish broths.

Basis for jellied meat and aspic

For cooking jellied meat, it is very important to properly prepare the products. Since those parts that are not used in other dishes - legs, tails, heads, go to jellied meat, they must be processed before cooking. The set for jellied meat must be pre-soaked in cold water for 3-12 hours to remove excess blood and soften the skin. After that, we scrape the meat ingredients with a knife and wash them again.

Next, as usual, put the food in a saucepan, add cold water, bring to a boil, remove the foam and cook over low heat for 15 minutes. But in this case, it is appropriate to drain the first broth. This will not only allow for greater transparency, but also reduce the calorie content of the jellied meat, because we are cooking a very rich broth.

The washed meat is poured with cold water, brought to a boil and, as described above, cooked for 5-6 hours over low heat. A multicooker helps a lot in this process, but if it is not there, it is quite possible to get by with a stove. Vegetables and roots are placed 1 hour before the end of cooking, salt and spices are added in 30 minutes.

As you can see, the preparation of a transparent broth requires attention and reverent attitude. But if for some reason it still becomes cloudy, you need to lighten it.

Boil the broth for jellied meat on very low heat, otherwise it will become cloudy

How to lighten cloudy fish, chicken, or meat broth

A guy will help restore transparency to the broth. From the name it is clear that the pull exists to pull off the turbidity, fat and foam flakes from the broth.

The easiest way to draw is with egg white. Beat the egg white a little with a fork and add a thin stream, while stirring, into the broth cooled to 70 degrees. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and cook, stirring for 2-3 minutes. The protein will capture all the dregs from the broth and sink to the bottom. It remains only to strain it.

Another way is to add minced meat diluted with water to the broth. For broth, minced meat is taken, for chicken - chicken. Mixed with egg white, diluted with a little cold broth or water. Minced meat is added to the broth, mixed, allowed to boil and cook for several minutes. The minced meat will cook and sink to the bottom. After that, the broth must be filtered through a fine sieve or cheesecloth.

Instead of minced meat, you can use grated carrots, then you do not need to dilute with water. The main principle: there should be a protein in the guy that will bind the dregs.

For fish broth, in the old days, a draw from pressed caviar was used. Now you can do with egg white.

Video: how to cook a transparent broth - a master class from the chef Ilya Lazerson

Now you know how to prepare a transparent broth and how you can restore its transparency. The main thing is to follow the rules and not forget about some tricks that even professionals use, because no one is immune from mistakes.