This Basic Homemade Vegetable Stock (or Vegetable Broth) is a great foundation for delicious soups, stews, risottos, pilafs, and curries. It is very easy to make, affordable, and doesn't require much time or effort.
Jump to:
This healthy and low sodium stock is made with a few basic vegetables and tastes much better than store-bought ones. Once you see how rewarding is to use your own homemade stock in your cooking, you will never use shop-bought ones again.
Ingredients and Substitutes
For making good vegetable stock, all you need is a few vegetables and aromatic herbs you have in your fridge. The main ingredients are onions, carrots, celery, peppercorns, bay leaves, and thyme.
Other extras you can add to your Vegetable Broth are :
Mushroom scraps, leek, fennel, parsley stalks, corn cobs, asparagus ends, garlic, parsnip, or even tomato peels.
Use some tomato paste or dried mushroom if you want to add an umami taste to your stock.
What Vegetables to Avoid
Although you can use most of the vegetables for stock, avoid the ones from the brassica family like cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, or kale, and also soft vegetables like potatoes, courgettes, cucumbers, eggplant, okra, and butternut squash.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Making Vegetable stock is extremely easy and doesn't require much hands-on time. However, to achieve the best results, you need to follow a few simple steps:
Start with preparing your vegetables. Peel and dice the onion and carrot into small cubes. Wash the celery thoroughly and slice it. Slice the mushrooms if using whole mushrooms.
Cut your vegetables into small cubes, the more surface area exposed, the more flavor will be passed on into the stock.
Place all the vegetables and aromatics in a large stockpot and fill it with cold water until all the vegetables are fully submerged and covered by a few centimeters.
Always start cooking stock with cold water as the act of bringing it to a boil with the ingredients already in helps bring the impurities to the top.
Bring the stock to a boil and skim the scum rising to the surface using a ladle. You only need to do that once or twice and it is essential for a clear stock. Turn the heat down to low and let it gently simmer for at least an hour.
Avoid stirring the stock while cooking or the impurities will turn the stock cloudy.
Strain through a fine sieve or a muslin cloth in a clean pot or bowl and let it cool down to room temperature before pouring them into jars or containers. Store it in the fridge for up to a week or in the freezer for up to 3 months.
You can brown the vegetables in oil before cooking in water for a richer deeper color and add more full-bodied flavor to dishes like Kuru Fasulye or Izmir Kofte (Smyrna Meatballs).
How to Use Vegetable Broth/Stock
You can use vegetable stock for making soups such as:
Roasted Cauliflower Soup with Celeriac, Vegan Pumpkin Soup, Autumn Squash Soup, Red Pepper and Tomato Soup, Ezogelin Corba, and Turkish Lentil Soup (Mercimek Corbasi).
You can also make risotto dishes such as Creamy Shrimp Risotto With Peas and Gourmet Mushroom Risotto, pilaf dishes such as Bulgur Pilavi (Turkish Bulgur Pilaf, and Turkish Rice (Sehriyeli Pilav), or stews such as Mediterranean Green Beans, Turkish Moussaka or Turkish Lamb Stew with Chickpeas.
Top Tips From the Chef
- Cut your vegetables into small cubes, the more surface area exposed, the more flavor will be passed on into the stock.
- Always start cooking stock with cold water as the act of bringing it to a boil with the ingredients already in helps bring the impurities to the top.
- Avoid stirring the stock while cooking or the impurities will turn the stock cloudy.
- If you want to freeze your homemade vegetable stock in glass jars, make sure you leave 3-4 centimeters of headspace in the jars when filling them up. The stock expands while freezing which causes breakage of the jar.
Recipe FAQ'S
Yes, especially homemade vegetable stock is made with all the vegetables with high in nutrition that helps our body function perfectly. It is also low in salt and full of vitamins, calcium, and iron.
You can keep vegetable stock refrigerated for up to 5 days or frozen for up to 3 months. Cool the stock down at room temperature and then put it in jars or airtight containers before refrigerating or freezing.
When it comes to vegetable stock or broth, there are no differences between them.
Related Recipes
For other great recipes that you can make with Vegetable Broth why not try:
Did you make this recipe? Please let me know how it turned out! Leave a comment below and tag @cookingorgeous on Instagram and hashtag it #cookingorgeous.
I hope you enjoy the process of making this easy veggie stock as much as you enjoy using it in your dishes! 🙂
Bon appétit! / Afiyet Olsun!
Basic Homemade Vegetable Stock
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoon olive oil (optional)
- 1 large onion (diced)
- 1 large carrot (diced)
- 2 celery sticks (sliced)
- 1 leek (optional) (sliced)
- 4 button mushrooms or equal amount of stalks and peels (optional) (sliced)
- 2 cloves garlic (optional) (lightly crushed)
- 4 bay leaves
- 5 sprigs thyme
- 10 peppercorn
- 5 stalks parsley (optional)
Instructions
- Place all the vegetables and herbs you prepared in a large stockpot.
- Fill the pot with cold water until all the vegetables are fully submerged and covered by a few centimeters.
- Put the stockpot on medium heat and bring it to a boil.
- When boiled, turn the heat to low and skim the scum rising to the surface using a ladle.
- Leave it to gently simmer for at least an hour, avoid stirring the stock while cooking for a clear finish.
- Strain through a fine sieve or a muslin cloth in a clean pot or bowl and let it cool down to room temperature.
- Store your stock in the glass jar(s) in the fridge for up to a week or in the freezer for up to 3 months.
Notes
- Use any vegetables available in your fridge apart from the ones from the brassica family like cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, or kale and also soft vegetables like potatoes and butternut squash.
- Always start making the stock from cold water.
- Use a large stockpot and fill it with cold water until all the vegetables are fully submerged and covered by a few centimetres.
- Gently simmer the stock on low heat and avoid stirring it while cooking.
- Store it in the fridge for up to a week or in the freezer for up to 3 months for future uses
- The stock expands while freezing which causes breakage of the jar. Therefore, leave 3-4 centimetres of headspace in the jars when filling them up.
Nutrition
This post use affiliate links. This means that if you click on them and then buy something, we get a small amount of commission to keep the site running, but it doesn’t cost you anything more.
Zahar
Such an easy recipe to follow, thanks for sharing!