For some of you, this is going to be old hat. If so, please feel free to wander off, and come back on Monday when I’ll muse about whatever day this is in quarantine.
So. Stock. Essential for soups, a good spag bol, chilli, casseroles and stews. Easy and yet often overlooked because you can buy stock cubes and little pot versions, and tubs of it in the supermarket.
Of course, currently supermarket deliveries are a bit of a challenge, and I’m trying very hard not to be wasteful. I mean, I’m already a saver of scraps, but now… It’s one of the few areas of lockdown life I can control. We eat well, I save scraps, I make stock, it gets frozen, I use it to make nice food, so we eat well.
It kind of makes sense.
Stock is a liquid full of flavour. Known in the States, and by fitness influencers as bone broth. Yep, basically the same stuff.
Often using meat bones, scraps of veg, peelings, stuff that’s seen better days. I tend to use leftover chicken carcasses, denuded of meat, rib bones, beef bones, hell I’ll chuck in the leftover bones from pork chops if I’ve got them. Add in that half an onion that was sitting in the fridge a little too long. A carrot, maybe a pepper that’s starting to go a bit wrinkly, and the leftover herbs that didn’t make it into that dish I made earlier in the week. And I sometimes will store bones and scraps in the freezer ready for when I have enough to throw into a pan.
To make it, throw everything in a pot, Water over the top, and bring it up to the boil. Then let it gently simmer.
And simmer.
Simmer some more.
Another hour.
Maybe another?
One more?
I mean, I do it over days. Eventually any bones become soft and crumbly. If it’s a vegetable stock I’m making, Once everything is damn near unrecognisable, the carrots are disintegrating, the cabbage stalks are soft, then I know we’re done.
Strain it and, if you’re not going to use it immediately, cook it down. concentrate it, that way it takes up less room in the freezer. And once you’ve reduced it, let it cool completely before you tub it up. That means that if it’s a meat stock, you can skim that fat right off, and bin it (please don’t dump it in the sink, that’s how fatbergs are created).
It’ll freeze for ages, and be the base of a rich ragu, or use it for gravy, or a jus. Speaking of gravy, every year, I pull together any leftover stock – anything in the freezer, except fish stock – and pile it into a pan. I’ll then cook it together, and reduce it til it’s lipsmackingly sticky, and that’s our Christmas gravy. Full of flavour, and full of loads of vitamins and good stuff. And there’s usually loads leftover. Meaning the curried leftovers are downright delicious.
You can do the same for fish too. I’ll admit, it gets a little more intense smell wise, though it won’t need anywhere near as long on the simmer. Fish bones, skin, shells from shellfish, can all be put in a pan with vegetables and herbs. It’s then ready in the freezer next time you fancy a bisque, chowder, of just use it to make your white sauce for fish pie.
It’s that straightforward. Now, if anyone needs me, I’m off to grab a tub of it out of the freezer – I rather fancy cottage pie for tea.
