Hmmmm... I always take that off cuz I dont wanna have to remove it.
Makes sense to use it for flavor. I always use shrimp shells to make fish stock.
Do you use a separate pot for those bits? Simmer and discard the flavoring agents? then add to broth to the soup?
Or do you just toss the garlic and onion altogether?
I like Onion in mine
I make the soup in two steps. Broth then soup. I toss the flavoring agents for two reasons. The first is that all the flavor is now gone! Especially with the chicken.
I save the breasts out to add to the soup. I only cook them enough to cook, not enough to extract all the flavor. The legs and thighs and other stuff I cut into about 1” pieces, (including the bones) then toss after cooking. There is just not enough meat left on the bones to justify the work to extract it, and what meat there is has very little flavor left, just bulk. (Trust me, I worked at this for years and finally got smart about it.)
Secondly, I like the veggies in my soup to have some body. If you toss the flavoring agents (which are totally limp and slimy now), then add new onions, carrots and celery to the soup, you have a little bit of fresh new flavor to kick things up, plus a nice texture. I saute them to caramalize them just a bit, and so I don’t have any “raw” onion taste that I have to cook out.