Soups and Stews | Overseeing the Care of my Household

Free broth? Really? How? Well it takes a little work but if you are willing to take a few extra seconds each time you prepare vegetables or meat and put a little bit of work into it you can make broth essentially for free!

Looks like trash right? Wrong. It is leftover butternut squash peels from the last time I made baby food. Not very appetizing right now but in broth they add lots of flavor as well as vitamins and nutrients. Just put them in a freezer bag and store in the bottom of your freezer until you are ready to make broth.

Whenever I make vegetables or a salad there is always some part of the vegetable that is unappetizing, peels, carrot tops, the bottom of a bunch of celery, etc. I keep a large bag in my freezer and instead of dumping these “trash” items in the trash I put them in the freezer bag.

I also save the bones, skin, fat bits and drippings from anytime I make chicken or turkey, also in a large bag in the freezer.
On the day I am going to make broth I get the largest pot in my kitchen (currently that is a turkey fryer pot I cleaned out. If you don’t have one pot big enough use several. I have been known to have four pots of broth going at once the day after Thanksgiving) and dump all my frozen veggie “rejects” and poultry bones, etc. into the pot. I then add enough hot water to fill my pot. Throw in some herbs if you like; I don’t add salt b/c I want to be able to salt the food I make with it according to my own tastes. For herbs, if I had any that I had bought that were about to go bad I would add those to my freezer bags, also I can pull a few sprigs from my kitchen garden if it is producing abundantly.

Bring your pot to a boil then reduce heat to a simmer for about 4 hours.

Since I am making quantity I find it best to pressure can these. However if you don’t have a pressure canner you can freeze the broth in usable portions until you are ready to use it.
For this batch of broth I used:
Butternut squash peel
The ends and peels from cooked beets
Peels and cores from apples
Carrot tops
Ends of celery bunches
Ends of tomatoes
Roots of green onions
A small bunch of leftover parsley that was starting to go bad before I could use it up.
Leftover chicken bones
A turkey carcass & fat drippings
Everything I used would have been “trash” otherwise so in essence I have “free” broth & I never have to pay for broth at the grocery store.