Kitchen Wisdom

Scratch Cooking, Gardening, Sourcing Food Locally on a Budget

  • Home
  • Blog
  • Shows
  • Tutorials
  • Reader Photos
You are here: Home / D.I.Y.convenience foods / Thrifty Stock

Thrifty Stock

October 20, 2013 by michelep

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
A hodgepodge of veggie trimmings otherwise destined to the compost heap are reclaimed!


Chicken necks, meat bones, and a handful of fresh herbs from the garden add character making this a truly frugal recipe.  Having a store of Thrifty Stock in the freezer enables you to stir up a pot of soup easily and inexpensively.  The whole process takes half a day, but requires very little hands-on time making it perfect for a stay-at-home day.  See How to Make a Muslin Stock Bag for directions on creating a handy helper for your soup-making endeavor, or simmer trimmings, bones, and spices loose and strain through a fine-mesh sieve at the end.

The Ingredients:
Miscellaneous Veggie Trimmings…
carrot peels and ends
celery leaves and bitter green stalks
onion skins and root ends
cabbage cores
shriveled mushrooms
tough asparagus ends
wilted parsley
broccoli, cauliflower, and kale stems
nothing moldy or slimy
no potato peels

Bones…
leftover chicken or turkey carcass, necks, wings (no skin or fat)
meat bones (no fat)

Seasonings…
1 tsp whole peppercorns
2 Tbs. sea salt
herbs of choice: thyme, garlic, parsley, fennel, sage, marjoram, bay leaves, lovage, etc.

1.  Reserve veggie trimmings and meat bones in gallon zippertop freezer bags in the freezer.  When you’ve filled 2-3 bags, thaw overnight in the refrigerator.

2.  The next day, dump it all in a lightly oiled turkey roaster, mist with olive oil, and roast uncovered at 425 degrees F for an hour or so, stirring 3 times.

3.  While that is going on, wash up your water bath canner (if enamel it must not be chipped) and put it on the burner with 2 gallons of water to heat.

Enclosing the ingredients in a muslin stock bag eliminates the need to strain the stock afterward.


4.  When the veggies and bones are well-roasted (I confess I sometimes skip the roasting step entirely) scoop them into a big muslin drawstring bag (see How to make a Muslin Stock Bag), add a teaspoon of whole peppercorns, 2 Tbs of sea salt, and extra herbs of your choice.  Pull the drawstring tightly closed and place carefully in the heating pot of water.  Add more water to nearly cover the stock bag (up to 2 inches from the top of the pot).  Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 3-4 hours, until it is flavorful and volume is somewhat reduced.  This perfumes the house wonderfully; you had better bake some bread, too.

5.  Taste and adjust salt if needed.  Salt is the principle flavoring in commercially prepared stock, along with monosodium glutamate (another form of salt that many people are sensitive or allergic to).  Here you can determine the amount of sodium.  If the flavor is not concentrated enough for your liking, you cam simmer the stock longer.

6.  When done, turn the burner off and allow the pot to cool 1 hour on the stove.  When it is cool enough to handle, carefully lift the stock bag from the pot into a colander set in a large bowl.  The contents of the bag can be fed to chickens (minus bones) or empties into the compost heap.  Since the ingredients were all contained in the muslin bag, there is no need to strain the stock   It will be clear, its color depending on the veggies you used.  And since there is no fat or skin involved, there is no need to skim grease off the top.  (Hurray!)

7.  Ladle stock into freezer containers leaving 1 1/2 inches headspace or wide-mouth Can-or-Freeze jars following the headspace marking indicated on jars.  This allow for expansion in the freezer.  You may have a kitchen utensil other than a ladle that you can use for scooping the stock that will save you time and drips on the counter.  You can also freeze a portion of the stock in ice cube trays dedicated to the purpose and later pop them into freezer bags.  Label containers and freeze at 0 degrees F. Use at your leisure (within 1 year) to make delicious economical homemade soups and happy memories.  Enjoy! 

Thrifty Stock in the freezer is like money in the bank!

* Care of Muslin Stock Bag:

After emptying the stock bag, turn inside out and scrape any loose particles free.  Rinse and toss into the washing machine.  Wash in warm or hot water with detergent, no fabric softener.  Tumble dry low in the dryer or line dry.  Fold stock bag away in your dish towel drawer and it will be ready for its next use.





Filed Under: D.I.Y.convenience foods, soup

Tag Cloud

hospitality

A little about Michele…

Gardener, seed saver, OSU Master Food Preserver, quilter, library-lover, journaler, wife and mom in a blended family. I love a cup of tea and a half hour of quiet in the morning.

Welcome to Kitchen Wisdom!

1 medium eggplant, cut in 1-inch pieces 4 large tomatoes (l lb), cut in 1 ½-inch pieces 2 medium zucchini or summer squash (l lb), cut in1-inch pieces 3 bell peppers, cut in 1-inch pieces 1 large … Read more

1 cup quinoa Place quinoa in a quart jar, add lukewarm water to nearly fill the jar, cover with a sprouting lid or piece of fine nylon netting secured with a rubber band and soak 8 hours or … Read more

"Baked" in the dehydrator crackers compete with the most gourmet crackers you'll find at the market. Designed for a square dehydrator, like the Excalibur, this recipe yields about 1 3/4 lbs. of … Read more

Shaping Variation:  Caramel Crown My aunt Sharon would fix Caramel Rolls for a special breakfast whenever we traveled to the Midwest to visit her, Uncle George, and my cousins John and Alayne. … Read more

Chai-Spiced Zucchini Cupcakes with Caramel Frosting Another great reason to grow or even <gasp!> buy zucchini.  These cupcakes are fluffy and tender, redolent with the aromas of nutmeg, … Read more

Last fall I ready a blog post by Kathi Lipp, one of my favorite bloggers. In it she talked about the importance of hospitality in friendship. (See the original post here~  www.kathilipp.com)  Many … Read more

Fragrant spices soaked in real half & half or coconut milk bloom into exquisite fullness in your refrigerator or freezer; brown sugar contributes a caramel-y undertone.  With this mix you are … Read more

When the weather heats up, grill your pizza! There is a way to make great pizza; pizza with a crackling crust and the tang of smoke, cheese that bubbles in pools around bits of garden … Read more

The ingredients are in your cupboard!   Handy sink set-up For this season's Kitchen Wisdom finale I want to leave you with another skill in your repertoire -homemade … Read more

Kill bacteria for less then a penny a bottle Three of the four bottles above are re-purposed.  From left to right are: tabasco bottle, tincture bottle, Sprayco pump spray bottle (new; … Read more

What are you looking for?

Pin it

Copyright © 2018 · Lifestyle Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in