Whole-Chicken Bone Broth

This is one of the quiet cornerstones of eating for an Autoimmune body, worth keeping on hand all the time. Made from a whole chicken, it gives you 2 gifts from 1 bird: a cooked dinner of meat now, and days of deep, gelatin-rich broth drawn from the bones and cartilage most kitchens throw away. It asks for real time, almost all of it unattended. You set it, and you let it work.

Much of the value is in what the long simmer draws out. Bones and cartilage give up glycine and collagen, the raw materials your gut lining and connective tissue lean on to rebuild, and a broth that gels in the fridge is your sign you drew them out. The splash of apple cider vinegar helps release minerals from the bone; the ginger, thyme, and rosemary add aromatic compounds of their own. This is the part of the work that adds back. Where elimination quiets what has been irritating a gut on high alert, a broth like this feeds the repair underneath it.

Let this be a steady base, not the whole plate. A healing gut wants variety above almost anything, so build your soups and braises on a wide range of vegetables through the week rather than the same few on repeat. And there is something magnificent in using the whole animal: a life fed you dinner, then gave you days of nourishment. Pause over that a moment before you ladle the first cup. On the hard days, let the pot do its slow work while the steady part of you keeps tending you Toward Remission.

Ingredients

• 1 whole chicken (skinned if it was conventionally raised)
• 1 medium onion
• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar (omit if you are sensitive to histamine)
• Water, to cover
• Vegetable scraps (onion skins, carrot ends, leek greens) for the long simmer

Spice rub:

• 2 teaspoons sea salt
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary

Note on swaps: the source lists an optional 1/2 teaspoon black pepper, which is excluded on AIP Core, so it is left out here. Cinnamon, ginger, onion powder, garlic powder, thyme, and rosemary are all Core safe. The apple cider vinegar is a permitted AIP vinegar, flagged only for low-histamine.

Method

• Rub the spice blend all over the chicken. Set the onion in the bottom of a slow cooker and place the chicken on top. Cook on low for about 2 hours, until the meat is cooked through.
• Pull the meat off the bird and set it aside to eat as a meal. Return all the bones and cartilage to the pot, add the vegetable scraps, and pour in water to cover by about 2 inches. Cook briefly on high.
• Discard this first round of water, which carries off the scum. Refill the pot with fresh water and a splash of apple cider vinegar.
• Simmer on low for 24 to 48 hours. The longer it goes, the more it draws from the bones.
• Strain the broth into jars. Once chilled, skim off and discard the firm fat layer on top. Freeze whatever you will not use within a few days.

Instant Pot variation

The Instant Pot gives you two paths to the same broth.

Slow-cook path: use the slow-cook function exactly as above. Cook the seasoned chicken on the onion until done, pull the meat, then return the bones and scraps with fresh water and vinegar and run the slow-cook setting low for as long as the long simmer (verify - untested conversion). This keeps the hands-off, set-and-forget feel.

High-pressure path, much faster: after pulling the meat, return the bones, cartilage, and vegetable scraps to the pot with fresh water (stay below the max fill line) and a splash of vinegar. Seal and cook on high pressure for about 2 hours, then let the pressure release naturally (verify - untested conversion). Strain, chill, and skim the fat the same way. You trade a little of the very-long-simmer depth for getting a gelling broth in an afternoon.

*Adapted from acleanplate.com*