An Ode to Homemade Chicken Stew

An’ it ain’t that crap out of a can neither

I grew up that way as a kid. My late mother would always have a pot of something going on in the old wood oven range all through the winter, and in Northern Maine, the winters were very long compared to the other 48 slightly warmer states. Alaska being an exception as their weather was always on par with ours back then.

She would make homemade bread or buttermilk biscuits to go with everything and they were some of the best evening meals after being out in the sub-zero cold nearly all day. Since we raised everything ourselves, the buttermilk was from our cows or a neighbor, along with the big pickle jar full of fresh milk straight from the cow. No store-bought for us. We couldn’t afford it anyway, much less travel the 30-mile round trip to the nearest grocery store during the winter months.

Those stew pots might have leftover roast beef, venison, or chicken from our winter stock. We raised beef and chickens and shot deer every year. She had a knack for knowing just how much spice to add the to pot to make the house smell just right and, taste, “it was to die for”, to quote an old cliché.

Then there was my father and his world-class clam chowder. Also made with our homemade butter and cow’s milk. He didn’t make the clam chowder or fish stew that often as my mother had to find the clams when she could get to town and find some on sale. Same for the fish, unless we used some trout we had caught that summer and put it in the freezer. But trout didn’t quite taste the same as saltwater fish so we didn’t do that very often.

Whenever he did make some, it was always a special treat. Usually when my mother would make a trip to town before a big storm blew in. Then the night of the storm, my late father would cook up one of his specialties.

As for my mother’s stews, I loved the homemade beef and chicken stews the best. I still do, although we don’t eat beef of any kind anymore at our age. Now, my wife will make one of her Chinese vegetable soups for cold nights and I have taken a homemade chicken stew recipe I found on the internet and tweaked it so that it reminds me of my mother’s…

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