Sweet Sue broth and the pantry shelf

Broth is the quiet can in the pantry. Nobody plans a supper around it, and half the suppers in a week pass through it: the rice, the gravy, the soup that uses up Sunday's chicken.

The Sweet Sue shelf has chicken broth in two can sizes and beef broth in one. This note covers what is in them, how far each can goes and what to cook with it. The second half is about the shelf itself: where cans live, what the dates mean and when a can should go in the trash.

The chicken broth is the same recipe in both cans. The small can pours about 2 cups, which is what a pan of rice or a quick gravy takes. The bulk can pours about 6 cups, enough for a stockpot.

Beef broth comes only in the 14.5 oz can and is sold as a pack of 4. It is the newest broth in the range. The trademark record first names canned beef broth under the Sweet Sue mark in a registration dated January 2, 2007.

The seasoning follows: monosodium glutamate, sugar, chicken fat, yeast extract, onion powder, hydrolyzed soy protein, natural flavor and spice extractives. Caramel color and beta carotene give the broth its gold. Silicon dioxide is an anti-caking agent.

Two items on that list matter to particular cooks. Monosodium glutamate is named outright, third on the label. Hydrolyzed soy protein is why the Contains line reads soy.

The beef broth is a shorter recipe of 7 ingredients: water, hydrolyzed soy protein, salt, dried beef stock, beef flavor (beef fat, flavoring, gum arabic), disodium inosinate and disodium guanylate, caramel coloring. It also contains soy. Its panel counts the cup by weight, 225 g, where the chicken broth counts 240 mL.

Soybeans are on that list, so all three broths call for a second look when a guest has a soy allergy. Read the Contains line on the can in your hand before the broth goes into a dish for someone else.

What the front of the can says

The front of the chicken broth can reads 99% fat free, and the panel backs it with 0 g of fat in a cup. The product details mark the chicken broth gluten free. Those are the label's words, and they describe the broth and not the dish you make with it.

Grocery shelves carry three things with similar names, and recipes use the words loosely. Broth is seasoned and ready to use as it comes. Stock is usually sold with little or no salt and is meant as a base the cook seasons. Bouillon is a dry cube, powder or paste that is dissolved in hot water.

The Sweet Sue cans hold broth. It arrives salted and flavored, so it can go straight into a mug or a pot. When a recipe written for unsalted stock meets a can of seasoned broth, the fix is simple: leave out the salt the recipe lists and taste at the end.

A can of broth and a bouillon cube should not share a pot. Each is seasoned to stand alone, and together they double the salt. If a soup needs more depth, reach for onion, celery, a bay leaf or a longer simmer.

A cup of the chicken broth carries 870 mg of sodium, which the panel counts as 38% of the Daily Value. The small can prints a second column for the whole can: 1,490 mg, or 65%. A cup of the beef broth carries 1,080 mg, or 45%.

Nobody drinks broth by the cup in a recipe, of course. Two cups of broth cooked into rice for four people divide into half a cup a plate. The label number is the start of the arithmetic and not the end.

Cooking with a salty broth

• Add the broth first and the salt last. Taste after the dish has simmered.
• Cut the broth with water, one part to one, for rice and for long-simmered soups that reduce.
• Skip other salty additions such as bouillon cubes or soy sauce when the liquid is canned broth.
• Use unsalted butter and plain vegetables around it.

A ten-minute chicken soup

Buyers call this the quick fix. Bring one 14.5 oz can of chicken broth and 1 cup of water to a simmer. Add a handful of egg noodles and a sliced carrot, and cook until the noodles are soft. Stir in a drained Chicken Breast in Water, 10 oz Can for the last 2 minutes. Finish with black pepper and parsley.

For a bigger pot, the Boneless Chicken with Broth, 50 oz Can brings its own broth along with the meat. And when a can of Chicken & Dumplings, 24 oz Can thickens on the stove, half a cup of chicken broth loosens it without thinning the flavor.

Beef broth on stew night

Beef broth earns its place in dishes that cook low and slow. Brown the meat, pour in a can to lift the browned bits from the pot, and let the stew do the rest. It also deepens onion soup, pot roast gravy and a pan of rice served with beef.

Rice cooked in broth

Rice is the easiest place to see what broth does. Use the same amount of liquid the rice package asks for, and replace half or all of the water with chicken broth. For 1 cup of long-grain rice that is usually 2 cups of liquid, which is one small can topped up with a splash of water.

Leave out the salt the package suggests. The broth has already seasoned the pot. A spoon of butter and some black pepper at the end is all it needs.

Gravy from a can of broth

Chicken broth makes the pale gravy for biscuits, mashed potatoes and chicken-fried steak. Beef broth makes the brown one for pot roast and meatloaf. The method is the same, and the flour adds wheat to a dish that had none.

Broth as a braising liquid

Vegetables cooked in broth take on more flavor than vegetables cooked in water. Simmer green beans, cabbage or collard greens in a cup of chicken broth with a sliced onion. Because the broth is salted, the usual ham hock or bouillon cube can stay out of the pot.

A buyer of the small can notes that it is small next to the resealable cartons in a grocery aisle. That is the trade. A can keeps for years unopened and takes little room, and a carton pours and closes. The bulk can gives the low price and asks you to use it within days.

Leftover broth freezes well. Pour it into an ice cube tray, and each cube is about 2 tablespoons for a pan sauce. Or freeze it flat in a zip bag in 1 cup portions.

The lowest price per fluid ounce today is 6¢ for Chicken Broth, 49.5 oz can, pack of 2. Buyers of the chicken broth praise the flavor and wish the price were lower, so the per-cup column is worth a glance before a case goes in the cart.

Sweet Sue chicken broth holds 4.4 out of 5 from 56 ratings across both can sizes. The praise is for taste. The complaints are about price and about cans that arrived dented.

That sentence is USDA's whole rule, and it is short on purpose. A can is a sealed system, and a dent on a seam or a rim can break the seal without any visible leak. A swollen can is a firm no.

When a case arrives with dented cans, report it from the order page before opening anything. The retail partner that took the order handles replacements. Photographs of the cans help.

A broth, a canned chicken and a ready dish cover most weeknight emergencies. With rice, noodles and frozen vegetables in the house, they make a week of fallback suppers.

• Monday: rice cooked in chicken broth, with canned chicken and peas stirred in.
• Tuesday: quick chicken noodle soup from a can of broth and a can of chicken.
• Wednesday: chicken and dumplings from the can, with green beans.
• Thursday: beef broth gravy over meatloaf or open-faced sandwiches.
• Friday: chicken salad sandwiches, and a mug of hot broth on a cold night.

None of it needs a recipe card. It needs cans that are in date, a shelf you can see into and the habit of replacing what you use.