The Easy Way Ina Garten Boosts The Flavor Of Chicken Stock

Chicken stock is one of the most versatile and comforting kitchen companions. Standing out on its own in an appetizer of consommé, soothing the sick in classic chicken noodle soup as broth, or thickening flavorful dishes like chicken pot pie, it's a staple and boon.

Chicken stock is usually considered more intense and richly flavored than broth, writes Martha Stewart. It's made by slowly simmering the meat and bones of chicken with added aromatics to extract the flavor. And it is said that bouillon is often used interchangeably with broth, getting its name from the French term for broths or stocks (via Simply Recipes). However, bouillon is also thought of as the concentrated paste made from broth, explains Bon Appétit, and many home cooks use bouillon in place of broth by diluting it with water.

Meanwhile, Ina Garten, of the "Barefoot Contessa," uses bouillon cubes in a unique way.

In Ina Garten's Food Network recipe for chicken pot pie, she adds two bouillon cubes to five cups of chicken stock. Bouillon flavors the entire dish, even if your broth is already "really flavorful," she says. The high salt content and concentrated flavor boosts up chicken broth so that all the ingredients in your dish get flavored (be it soup or pot pie). Bon Appétit describes bouillon as having a more prominent chicken flavor. Food & Wine adds that bouillon cubes are packed with umami flavor, which only helps develop the flavor of chicken stock.

Bouillon is affordable, easy to find, and doesn't take up too much space. These virtues alone support the reasoning to have it on hand. It is available in powders, cubes, bases, and pastes, writes Simply Recipes. And using it to boost chicken stock like Garten has us saying, "How easy is that?"