Vegetables stock- your base to many vegan/vegetarian dishes

This recipe makes 1 liter of finish stock. A stock or a broth is basically a flavoured liquid preparation. It forms the basis of many dishes, particularly stews, soups and sauces. Making a vegetable stock involves simmering vegetables. Imagine just infusing all the flavours of the vegetables into a liquid, just like you will do when you have a tea. A flavourful stock is the base and a key to successful vegetarian and vegan cooking. Homemade stock almost always tastes better than already made commercial stocks, and this is never truer than with vegetable stock. Remember that making a stock requires good and fresh vegetables.
Servings: 10 yield(s)
Prep Time: 20 mins
Cook Time: 55 mins
Total Time: 75 mins
Ingredients
  • 10 ml olive oil
  • 100 g Carrot
  • 100 g Brown onion
  • 100 g Celery
  • 100 g Leek
  • 50 g Tomato
  • 1 stick Thyme
  • 5 stick Parsley stalk
  • 2 Bay leaves
  • 5 g Garlic
Instructions
  1. Gather all your vegetables
  2. Peel your vegetables (onions, carrots, garlic)
  3. chopped your vegetables to 1 cm section
  4. Do the same for the onions. Crush the garlic
  5. Same for the celery branch.
  6. Here i use the green of the leek for the stock.
  7. clean all the vegetables under cold water.
  8. place them in a bowl
  9. in a large sauce pot, heat up a little bit of olive oil. Many people will say you do not need to do this. Yet i like it has it helps sweating the onions without attaching to the pot.
  10. sweet your onions until they become translucent. It make take 2 to 3 min then add the garlic. This is call sweating, it means we release the natural sugar and moisture of the onion the concentrate the base of our stock.
  11. Add all the vegetables at once and keep cooking at moderate heat for 3 min. They will become all bright and shiny.
  12. Add the parsley stalk and thyme.
  13. Add the bay leaves. the Purist chefs will make a Bouquet garni ( a bundle of aromates). as it is a vegetable stock you can throw it all in.
  14. Add about 1.5 l of water.
  15. Bring the stock to a boil.
  16. Once to a boil, reduce the heat until it simmers. Simmering means slow or gentle boiling. Few little bubble action in the pot.
  17. keep cooking for 35 min. You do not need to stir it. If for some reason you see some impurity on top of the stock, just use a spoon to remove them (skim the top of the liquid).
  18. It really does not need to be cooked longer than 35 min.
  19. Using a bowl and a fine mesh strainer, strain the entire stock in a large bowl.
  20. Voila, this is your stock/broth done... Your infusion and extraction of all the goodies in a liquid form.
Recipe Notes

As a well known said once " The basic stock is not the bin of the kitchen". He meant that you should use fresh vegetables and not old left overs. Always peel and remove unwanted part of the vegetables you would not eat yourself. Such as the base of leek, peel of the onions. Over cooked stocks or stock that boils all the way becomes grey and cloudy. When you do this you change the flavours as well as the nutrition value of the stock. To cool down your stock faster separate it in different containers. You can keep your stock in the fridge for up to 5 days and  in the freezer for up to 3 months.  I generally double this recipe and cook it once a month. You can use it in many type of cooking to enhance your dishes. Risotto, paella, soups, sauce.... Happy Stocking everyone