Homemade Roasted Vegetable Stock

Christmas is a comin' and so is Christmas dinner and the preparations are already underway. We're boring on Christmas dinner, it tends to be a repeat of Thanksgiving which is to say that we'll be having roast turkey. Oh sure, some years we branch out and bake a ham or a prime rib but if the truth be told the Hendo family are turkey fans at the holidays. I brine my turkeys, I know others think that's an unnecessary step, but I know what works for me and as long as you are using a natural, unprocessed turkey, I wouldn't dream of not giving it a good sitting in brine.

My brine recipe will be the topic of another post, suffice it to say that one of the ingredients is a gallon of vegetable stock which is today's project. Oh sure, it's on sale at the grocery store right now so I could easily just buy the stuff that Swanson makes and be done with it. But homemade stock is incredibly easy, it tastes infinitely better, and I'll save some money by making it myself.

Here's my line-up - it should make Hailey proud: carrots, celery, turnips, green peppers, onions, shallots, garlic, Italian parsley and sliced mushrooms.Hell, they're even all organic - or so the bin says at the grocery store but sometimes I think that's just a ploy to charge an extra dime per pound. You can use almost any vegetable you have in the pantry or the fridge, just shy away from those very strong-flavored things like broccoli or cabbage and you'll be fine.

We start with a course chop on everything that's "sturdy". No need to dice these fine, we just want to increase the surface area that we're working with. And best of all - I don't peel a thing except for the turnip.

First come the carrots, a full pound:

Follow this with a bunch of celery. Don't add the leaves but don't dare toss them either. We'll add them to the liquid after everything has roasted in the oven.

Next comes the turnip - the one thing that I actually peel (although I'm not sure why, I believe someone once told me the peel would make the final broth bitter).

Now a couple of green peppers - cored and (mostly) seeded.

The shallots are next and note that there is no need to peel them. Just slice off the ends and at least quarter them.

The onions get the same treatment as the shallots - skin on, ends off. Both the shallot and onion skins will help color the final broth.

Just trim the top off of entire head of garlic - no need to peel - we're just going to let it roast and then squeeze out the cooked garlic when we add it to the stock. You know we call a whole garlic a head which contains individual cloves. Did you know that in some countries they call the head a foot and the cloves are called toes? Neither did I but so says the Internet.

Finally we add the one non-sturdy ingredient in this phase; a half pound of thickly sliced mushrooms.

All of this gets tossed into a roasting pan and liberally drizzled with olive oil and seasoned with a little fresh ground pepper and kosher salt. Give it a good stir and pop it into a 400 degree oven. You're going to want to roast this for an hour to an hour and a half - stirring it every 20 minutes - until the vegetables are soft and the onions have begun to caramelize.

Ah yes - a bit over an hour later and this looks just about right.

Transfer all into a large stock pot, being sure to scrape every bit of goodness that you can from the roasting pan.Gently squeeze the garlic goodness into the pot. This is one of the fun parts - the garlic goodness comes squishing out much like toothpaste from a tube. Discard the outer crust from the garlic.

Now we add some aromatics - like those celery leaves we saved and a handful of Italian parsley. Toss in a half dozen whole peppercorns, 2 or 3 bay leaves, 5 whole cloves and a couple of teaspoons of dried thyme, and whatever else seems right to you. As I was looking for the thyme I spied some freeze-dried scallions and some Herbes de Provence so I added some of them too.

Then add the water - I need a gallon of this stuff so I'm adding about 18 cups of water to allow for reduction. Now I suppose I could have gone down to Matrimony Spring to fetch my water - the spring that the county health department tried to close down a couple of years ago due to unusually high coliform  bacteria counts - but sorry Hailey, I'm just getting this directly from the tap. I like our municipal water in Moab just fine.

Bring to a low boil on medium heat, turn to low, and let simmer, mostly covered, for about an hour.And simmer means simmer - not a rolling boil - you're coaxing flavors out, not scaring them to death. After the simmer, drain through a colander. Since I'm using  this as a brine ingredient I don't worry about things like peppercorns making it through the holes in the colander - if you're using this as a soup stock you may want to use a sieve with a finer mesh. Now you could do all sorts of things with the cooked (and now mush) vegetables, like give them a spin in a food processor to make some sort of binder or thickening agent for a future dish - me? I'm throwing it away. Those valiant vegetables have given up their all! They have done their duty.

Now I wanted to show you just what a lovely color the finished broth is. The only clear container I could spy that would hold the entire batch was my mother-in-law's antique crystal punch bowl. I'm just guessing here but I'm thinking that maybe Mrs. Hendo wouldn't have seen the logic in that display. So I'll ladle a little broth into a measuring cup instead.

Score! Over a gallon of homemade vegetable stock. More than enough for my brine recipe with enough left over for all those moments when cooking a holiday dinner that you just need a little liquid in something. Oh did I mention that it tastes wonderful? Well it does. Rich yet light, and tones of every one of the ingredients. Very nice. Oh sure, if I was planning on using it as s soup stock I would likely have added a splash of Worcestershire, a bit of sesame oil, and maybe just a splash of soy sauce. As an all-purpose vegetable stock it is just right.