Does great soup flavor come from the bone? I've been making a lot of chicken soup lately, this time I used boneless, skinless thighs.?

Bones and other "connective tissue" are what make "stock," and stock is much fuller-flavored than "broth" which is made with meat only. Some people don't follow those technical definitions, but they're useful.

So your thigh meat didn't make as strongly-flavored soup as having used chicken pieces with bone in for previous soups. And neither of those would be as strongly-flavored as having used bare bones and other connective tissue.

Strength of flavor will also depend on the proportion of animal parts to water, and the length of cooking time.

(Lots of people flavor their stocks with onion, carrot, celery, peppercorns and a bay leaf as a routine thing too.)

(Stocks can be added to stews and other things too.)

You'd probably be interested in more about stock and broth, etc, in my previous answers here:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=201109...

...how to make stocks (easier/quicker to longer):

http://www.google.com/search?q=how+to+make+stock

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Bones do add extra flavor to soups, be it the chicken bones or beef bones. You can freeze the carcasses from roasted or barbecue chickens and when you 2 or 3, make chicken stock. I recently found chicken feet in my market and made the best soup I ever made. They are pretty awful looking and some have to be skinned. I also cut the nails off and that was a bit squeamish.

Edit: When making chicken soup, I will buy the cheapest bone-in chicken I can find. The chicken cooks in the stock for 30-45 minutes. I then remove the chicken and pull of the meat. The bones go back into the pot. If I am lucky enough to find chicken feet, once the soup is cooked, those do get trashed, but the flavor is worth it. If I find chicken backs, necks etc. cheap, I just buy them an keep them in the freezer.

Bones add depth of flavor to a broth, as do root vegetables. My best experience is to cut the chicken meat from the bones, crack the larger bones and roast them at medium high temperature until they brown, then prepare the stock with those bones, carrot, onion and some celery. When it develops layers of flavor, season and add the meat.

Fat adds a richness and mouth feel to foods. But a tablespoon or two of chicken fat is usually enough for the pot.

I sometimes make chicken and noodles by cutting up a whole chicken and boiling it, then removing the chicken pieces, removing the skin and bone. I remove most of the fat from the broth by either chilling it and taking it off the top, or by using a pitcher with a bottom discharge that leaves the fat in the pitcher. Then return the meat to the pot with seasoning vegetables and salt/pepper. Finally add the noodles and cook until almost done.

Served over mashed potatoes, this is the ultimate comfort food.

Bones do add a lot of flavor. When I'm making stock or soup, I always crack the bigger bones open, to allow the marrow to add flavor, too.

Bone does add a lot of flavor, as does the skin.

Simmer a carcass for a while and it will be very tasty soup.

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