My guess is pretty much any decent cook can take a chicken carcass or some beef bones and make a decent stock from it. I regularly save roasted chicken remains and freeze them until I have enough to make a big batch of chicken stock. It’s thrifty, easy, and much tastier and more healthful than bouillon cubes and powders and the like (although I will admit to using a couple of Penzeys soup bases in a pinch). But what about vegetable stock? Turns out it is every bit as easy to make—and for the investment of ingredients and time, it’s an even better payoff than homemade meat stocks. Best of all, homemade stock won’t have unknown quantities of mystery or undesirable ingredients like modified food starch or MSG. This stuff is liquid gold when it comes to adding a nice flavor boost to rice, polenta, and pasta sauces. And of course, it makes a splendid base for building other sauces, or gravies, soups, and stews.

I use a simple recipe from The Best 125 Meatless Italian Dishes for my vegetable stock, tweaked for my preferences. Even though it is Italian in provenance, the stock ingredients can be changed around to make it more or less Italian in flavor, to suit one’s preferences and needs. As I use it in a lot of things, my preferred stock is relatively light on Italian flavor, but nonetheless luscious.

I store the stock three different ways: I freeze a bunch in cubes, for easy use in small quantities; I freeze pint and quart jars of it for use as the base for soups; and I can quarts for nonrefrigerator storage (freezer space is always at a premium). The canning method is from the Ball Blue Book of Preserving.

Basic Italian Vegetable Stock

Yields about 2 quarts stock

14 C. water
2 medium russet or baking potatoes, diced medium
2 medium yellow onions, diced medium
1 rib celery, chopped
1 green bell pepper, diced
8 oz. mushrooms, chopped
2 C. assorted vegetables*
6 cloves garlic, chopped
2 bay leaves
2 t. dried rosemary
2 t. dried basil
1/2 t. dried thyme
1/2 t. peppercorns
3/4 t. salt

Put all ingredients in large stockpot and set to boil over medium-high heat. Once the water boils, reduce heat to maintain a simmer; simmer, uncovered, for 45 minutes. Turn off heat and allow vegetables to steep for an additional 30 minutes. Strain stock into containers if refrigerating or freezing. If freezing in jars, allow one inch of headspace. Refrigerated stock will keep for about one week; frozen stock will keep about a year.

To can stock, strain liquid from vegetables; return to stockpot and bring to boil again. While broth heats, prepare jars and lids for canning; have pressure canner ready with ample water at full boil. Ladle hot stock into hot jars, leaving one inch of headspace. Process pints for 30 minutes, and quarts for 35 minutes at 10 pounds pressure. After jars have been out of the canner for 24 hours, clean and dry them; label lids and store in cool, dark place.

Vegetable Note: Choices for the assorted vegetables include fennel bulbs, red peppers, broccoli stalks, carrots, spinach or chard stems. Broccoli and other cabbage family members can dominate the stock’s flavor, so if you use any of them, keep the total of all items at or below 1 C. (Return to recipe)

My preferred vegetable blend: I omit the green pepper, as I despise its taste. I add 2–3 chopped carrots, and use portabella mushrooms, increasing the quantity of them to 1 pound. As I don’t usually have rosemary on hand, I omit it, and instead use Italian oregano, flat-leaf parsley, and 1 t. thyme and less basil. If I can I use fresh herbs—a good guideline is to double or treble the quantity of dried herbs called for.

One needn’t be overly picky about quantities and ratios for the stock, the only exception being if one uses broccoli, cauliflower, etc., as mentioned above. A good guideline is to use about twice as much water as vegetables, and don’t let any single vegetable dominate the mix. Another flavorful variation might be roasting some or all the veggies first: onions, garlic, celery, carrots, and peppers all take on different but wonderful flavors when roasted. A generous dash of Tabasco sauce or red pepper flakes will give a subtle kick to the stock. Many possibilities abound; experiment and keep notes on your results, so you can develop a custom blend that works best for you. Once you get that recipe finalized, the base recipe can easily be doubled or trebled; then, one day’s work can keep you in divine, healthful vegetable stock all year.