Many of the recipes from or website often call for stock. Canned vegetable or meat stock certainly works fine, but making your own stock is easier than you might think, infinitely better tasting, and just a sensible approach to using up every last bit of goodness from your locally grown food.
With a little planning, you can have fabulous homemade stock ready to enhance the flavor of almost any savory recipe asking for stock or water.
Vegetable Stock
The key to making vegetable stock is remembering to save many of your cooking remnants. Just toss the clean vegetable trimmings, from stems to stalks to peelings, into plastic zipper bags or plastic containers and keep
them in the freezer until there is enough for the stock pot.
Once you’ve accumulated enough veggie scraps to fill a gallon-size freezer bag, you’re ready to make a batch of stock. You want to save:
- onion ends and skins
- ends of carrots, celery, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and beets
- garlic and ginger skins
- mushroom stems
The only things you don’t want to put into a stock are foods from the brassica, or crucifer, family.
Crucifers-including cabbage, arugula, broccoli, bok choy, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, collards, kale, kohlrabi, mustard greens, Swiss chard, radishes, rutabagas, turnips, turnip greens, and watercress- will make the stock bitter and gas-producing.
Place all the vegetables trimmings together in a large stockpot-at least 4 quarts-and fill it with water. Ideally, you will have about a 1 to 3 ratio of vegetables to water. Cover the stockpot, set it over medium heat, and bring the pot to a boil. Maintain a rolling boil for about 30 minutes, then reduce the heat slightly to a simmer. Continue simmering the stock, covered, for 2 to 3 hours.
The goal is to reduce the stock considerably as it deepens in color and aroma. You really can’t overcook stock-the more it cooks, the thicker and richer it will get. But after a good number of hours, remove the pot from the heat and let the stock cool.
When it is well cooled, pour the stock into another container through a fine-meshed sieve (such as a chinois) or a colander lined with cheesecloth to remove all the vegetable debris . You can then measure this wonderful, dark thick stock into smaller plastic containers and freeze it until needed.
It helps to store it in 1- or 2-cup portions for cooking purposes. It can also be handy to freeze some in ice cube trays so you can add a cube or two to the steamer when you’re cooking vegetables or when you need just a smidge of flavor and liquid to thin a sauce or gravy.
Another Soup Stock
If you want to prepare a stock using whole vegetables rather than scraps, try this recipe. It never fails.
1 large leek, rinsed and cut up 1 stalk celery, cut into about 3-inch lengths
5 carrots, chopped in half 4 stems parsley
1 head garlic (at least 8 cloves) 1 sprig fresh thyme
2 red bell peppers 8 peppercorns
1 pound tomatoes 2 bay leaves
2 large onions 1 cup red wine
2 tablespoons olive oil 4 quarts water
1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes 2 teaspoons salt
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coat the leek, carrots, garlic, peppers, tomatoes, and onions in olive oil and place them in a roasting pan. Roast the vegetables until they are well browned, about 11/4 hours.
Wrap the celery, parsley, thyme, peppercorns, and bay leaves in cheesecloth and tie it closed to create a bouquet garni. After transferring the roasted veggies to a large stockpot, pour the wine into the roasting pan and stir with a wooden spoon to deglaze the pan.
Scrape the wine and all the pan scrapings into the stockpot. Add the water, bouquet garni, sun-dried tomatoes, and salt. Then follow the instructions given above for cooking, straining, and storing stock
Tags: homemade stock, making stock, Soup Stock, Vegetable Stock
January 23rd, 2012 at 3:12 am
Great post! Will read every one on your site, good job!