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I dump the entire contents of the bag into a stockpot and add enough water to cover the frozen vegetables plus an inch or two.
A close up of kitchen scraps in a stockpot with salt, spiced and water.
Dump your ugly broth bag into your stockpot, and an hour later you’ll have wonderful broth.
Then I toss in the following:
Several sprigs of fresh thyme if I have it, or a teaspoon of dried thyme if I don’t
1 bay leaf
½ a teaspoon of whole peppercorns
1 tablespoon of salt
Turn the heat on medium-high and wait. Once the broth starts to bubble, I turn the heat down and let it simmer happily for half an hour. You don’t want to let it go much further than 40 minutes as some of the vegetables contain a compound called terpenoids, which can turn bitter if heated for too long.
At this point, the house starts to smell amazing. I taste the broth and add more salt if needed before straining it through a cheesecloth-lined colander into a bowl. You don’t have to use the cheesecloth, but I would suggest it if you want a lovely clear broth.
A jar of vegetable broth set on a cutting board with a decorative cloth behind it.
One freezer bag usually yields about two quarts.
Use your broth right away or freeze it and use it as needed. Don’t forget to label your broth with the date and whether it’s vegetable stock or chicken broth.
Save Your Bag and Reuse It
Please don’t start with a new bag each time. Unless there are holes in the bag, you can simply seal the two empty bags and toss them in the freezer to be filled up again for the next batch. I’ve been using my current ugly broth bags for about two years now.
A freezer bag full of kitchen scraps within another freezer bag is sitting on a cutting board next to an onion sliced in half.
I hope you share this fun kitchen tip with your friends and family. And I hope you enjoy having healthy homemade stock at hand without all the fuss, all through the year.
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