Homemade Vegetable Stock
A lovely light vegetable stock is really easy to make; if you haven't made stock before don't be intimidated. Prep the vegetables, throw it all into a large cooking pot, add water and bring up to a boil, then lower to a gentle simmer. The prep time for this is really no more than 5-10 minutes. You can leave the stock cooking away whilst you get on with other things. The stock will be done and ready to strain after 1 hour.
Homemade stock transforms your cooking: use it to enrich soups, sauces and risottos. It also makes an excellent cooking liquid for rice, cous cous, lentils, or quinoa: which will absorb all the goodness and flavour. Not only will the taste be sensational but, there is the extra benefit of added nutrition. One of the main reasons to make your own vegetable stock is that you can make it without salt, or with very little salt. And there are absolutely no preservatives to worry about. When I am cooking for babies, who cannot eat salt before 1 years, or for my children and friends children I like to know that the base stock I am using is salt and preservative free. If you have beautiful vegetables you can also just rinse, or scrub the vegetables, and not peel them (this is personal preference). A nice time saver - for a tried parent!
Below is the base recipe I follow - but once you feel confident making this stock use what you have: leeks, a sprig of thyme, a fennel bulb, a potato and so on… Really any vegetable you like to flavour the broth. Keep a bag in the freezer for vegetable scraps or herbs and vegetables past their prime and they can be added in as well, it’s an opportunity to cook vegetables which need using up and waste less. We recently filmed making this recipe, so scroll to the bottom and watch/ cook along as I make it.
Weaning
Recommended as soon as your baby has had all the ingredients separately (e.g. parsnip, carrot etc.). You can then start adding this homemade stock into your purees and weaning recipes. Here it is added into a lovely puree of carrot, sweet potato and parsnip. It is a great way of blending purees to a lovely consistency, rather than using boiled water.
1.5 - 2 litres filtered water
2 large carrots
2 parsnips
1 large sweet potato
1 large onion
1-2 sticks of celery
3-4 sprigs of fresh parsley
1 large bay leaf
6 black peppercorns (optional)
prep time 10 mins ~ cooking time 1hr
Prep all the vegetables: wash, trim, peel and cut into large chunks; you dont have to peel the vegetables, if they are well scrubbed, this is optional.
Place all the vegetables in a large cooking pot, add the aromatics (parsley, bay leaf and peppercorns) if using; then cover with filtered water. Bring to the boil. Once boiling, skim off any foam that rises to the surface and discard, trying not to remove too much of the cooking water.
Loosely cover and simmer on a low heat for 1 hour. The stock should be golden in colour and the vegetables completely falling apart. Take the stock off the heat.
Immediately strain the liquid stock; from the vegetables, into a large bowl so that you are left with a clear golden stock. Once cool refrigerate, this can be done overnight. It is ready to use.
freeze the stock
Homemade vegetable stock can be frozen in ice cube trays. I find it really useful to just add frozen stock cubes, or defrosted) into my cooking: that way you always have homemade stock to hand, as you need it.
It freezes really well, and will keep in the freezer for 3-4 months