Frugal Friday – Vegetable Stock

I LOVE soup. I could live on it. And when I’m not eating soup, I’m using stock to boil rice or other grains.

It occurred to me recently that buying stock is probably quite a lot more expensive than making your own. I haven’t steeled myself for boiling up fish heads or giblets yet, but I did make a rather nice vegetable stock last weekend, and it was extremely simple.

The frugal beauty of this is that the most expensive thing in this were the dried mushrooms that I threw in (and they probably cost me about 50 cents). Everything else was stuff I had anyway, and stuff I would have thrown away (I wasn’t planning on using the beet leaves or the hard stems from the kale, the outer cabbage leaves or its heart).  Shopping around, I found that vegetable stock can cost $6 for the same amount of the cheapest one I could find, $11 for the nice organic brand I like.

So here’s my recipe. It’ll need salt, of course, but I thought I’d leave that out until I’m actually using it.

JULIE’S VEGETABLE STOCK
4-5 Red cabbage leaves and heart
Beet leaves (from a bunch of three beets)
3 spring onions
thumb-sized piece of ginger, chopped
Kale stems
1/2 red pepper
soy sauce (a few splashes)
handful of flat leaf Italian parsley
5 dried morrel mushrooms
1 potato
10 black peppercorns
3 taps of ground sage (sprinkler lid)
16 cups of water

Chop up vegetables roughly. Place in large stock pot. Heat until it reaches the boil (which takes quite a long time) then simmer for 30 minutes (or longer). Leave to cool. Put 2-4 cups into freezer bags, mark quantity on bag, and freeze. Use as needed.

Makes about 12 cups of stock

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Fried Potatoes

This is a great way to use up left-over baked or boiled or roast potatoes (if you ever have such a thing).

Delicious, nutritious and super-simple. Even my kids will eat this, and Weight Watchers approves too!

INGREDIENTS

1 large potato or several smaller ones
Olive Oil
Salt

METHOD

1. If your potato is already cooked, slice it cross-wise into circles about half or three-quarters of an inch thick. If not, scrub it, prick with a fork and cook in the microwave for 5-8 minutes, turning over once. No need to over-cook.
2. Heat a layer of oil about as deep as the potatoes are thick  in a skillet until it is almost smoking (if it’s smoking, it’s too hot. Taking off the heat for until it cools a bit).
3. Slide your potato slices into the sizzling oil and cook for a couple of minutes until bottom is golden brown and a little crispy. Turn and cook for another couple of minutes.
4. Drain on paper towels and dust with salt.

This can be left to cool and packed into a lunch box and, my five year old swears, makes a great accompaniment to a packed lunch.

SERVES 2

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