Chicken base substitutes

The exact functional equivalent, and the only swap that works whether the base is going into liquid or being used as a dry seasoning. Both products are engineered around the same dilution, one unit to one cup of water, so nothing else in the recipe has to change.

Best for

gravy, rice and other grains, soups, stews, pan sauces, stuffing and dry rubs

The difference you will taste is fat. Chicken base carries rendered chicken fat and concentrated chicken solids, and that fat is what makes broth taste rounded rather than merely salty; a cube leans much harder on salt, dried flavourings and yeast extract, so it comes out flatter and sharper. Stir in a small knob of butter or a teaspoon of schmaltz per cup and it lands noticeably closer. Crush the cube first and dissolve it in a little hot liquid, or you will find undissolved shards later.

Rather than trying to replace a concentrate with a concentrate, replace the broth the concentrate was going to make and delete the water the recipe added next to it. This is the best-tasting route in anything where the broth is the body of the dish.

Best for

soups, risotto, braises, poaching chicken, cooking grains, gravy

The trap is salt. Recipes built on chicken base have usually had their other salt reduced because the base is so salty, so switching to carton broth almost always leaves the dish tasting flat. Add about a quarter teaspoon of salt per cup and correct upward. The flavour is also cleaner and lighter, without the concentrated roasted note base has, which some people prefer. This route cannot work at all if the base is being used dry with no water in the recipe.

What chicken base is a factory version of. Simmer stock, ideally homemade, until it goes syrupy and coats a spoon, and you have a spoonable concentrate with real chicken flavour and real gelatine in it.

Best for

pan sauces, gravy, risotto, braises, enriching a soup at the end

This is the only substitute here that tastes better than the original rather than merely acceptable, and the only one where the fat and gelatine are genuinely present, so a pan sauce made with it has a glossy body that no cube can produce. Two honest catches: it takes 30 to 40 minutes of unattended simmering, and it contains almost no salt, so you must season the dish separately rather than relying on the concentrate to do it. A tablespoon of the jelly that sets under a roast chicken does the same job in seconds if you happen to have it.

The free option most people throw away. The browned juices in the bottom of a roasting tin, or in the tray under a supermarket rotisserie chicken, are concentrated chicken flavour plus fat plus a little salt, which is precisely the description of chicken base.

Best for

gravy, pan sauces, rice cooked alongside a roast, soup made from the carcass, dressing and stuffing

Skim most of the fat off first or the sauce will be greasy, and scrape the sticky browned bits from the tin with a splash of water because that is where the flavour is. Seasoning is unpredictable: a supermarket rotisserie chicken is heavily brined and its drippings can be as salty as the base itself, while a plain home roast will need most of the half teaspoon of salt. Taste, then decide. Drippings also carry whatever the bird was seasoned with, so a lemon-and-herb chicken will push the dish in that direction.

The right answer when the reason you are substituting is that you do not want poultry in the dish. Both are built to the same one-teaspoon-per-cup dilution, so the recipe's mechanics do not change at all.

Best for

vegetarian and vegan soups, risotto, grains, braises, gravy

Neither pretends to be chicken, and that is fine in most dishes and obvious in a few. Vegetable base is sweeter and much more carrot and celery forward, which reads as slightly odd in something that is supposed to taste of poultry. Mushroom seasoning powder is earthier and deeply savoury and will darken a pale broth to beige. If you want the closest vegetarian match, use a teaspoon of white miso with a pinch of onion powder and a knob of butter, which gets the salt, the paste consistency and the fat right even though the flavour is beanier.

The honest answer for a single teaspoon of base disappearing into a large pot of chilli, curry, stew or rice, where most of what it was contributing was salt, a savoury lift and a trace of fat.

Best for

large pots of soup or stew, chilli and curry, rice and grains, braises, beans

Genuinely adequate in a dish that already has plenty of flavour of its own, and genuinely inadequate in anything where the chicken broth was the point. In a clear chicken soup, a matzo ball soup or plain rice this tastes like salted water, so use a cube there instead. MSG supplies the savoury depth without adding colour, which is why it beats soy sauce in a pale dish; a splash of soy sauce works just as well in anything already brown.