Waste not, stock pot.

Earlier this year, I posted three new-year's food resolutions:

1. Cook simpler on weeknights (save the big-bang meals for weekends)
2. Minimize food waste (mostly in the form of being more clever about how I use what I already have in the pantry, fridge or freezer)
3. Explore more ways to extend my love of food (suggestions welcome)

I've been doing better on #1 and #3 (stay tuned), but #2 is probably my most recent area of focus. True, it takes a certain amount of increased attention to be constantly aware of what's hanging out in your pantry/fridge/freezer, but it's been an interesting challenge. The easiest new habit I developed is saving all trimmed vegetable bits in a freezer bin, which is periodically emptied into a pot of boiling water to make vegetable stock.

I can't tell you how satisfying it is to take this...

...and make it into this...

...which, in turn, gets made into things like this:

I've made a few batches of veggie stock now, and I've learned a thing or two:

• Keep a plastic bin in the freezer so you can easily add to it (it fills quickly, trust me; I have a two-quart sized container, and it fills in about a week and a half)
• Vegetables with less water content freeze better
• Basically you want tough parts of plants - they'll hold up to a good boiling and give out flavor without disintegrating
• Starchy vegetables (like potatoes) make the broth cloudy
• Colorful vegetables (red chard) will dye the broth 

On my shortlist:

• Mushroom stems
• Parsley stems
• Carrot peel
• Celery ends
• Onion trimmings
• Brussels sprout ends
• Broccoli stems
• Eggplant/squash ends

Basic recipe: Cover your vegetables with water (I use a five-quart pot for two quarts of frozen vegetables). Add aromatics (bay leaves, peppercorns, herbs dried up in the fridge past their prime) and salt (~2 t coarse salt for the aforementioned amounts). Cover and bring to a boil, then uncover and simmer for 45 min. Turn down the heat, re-cover and continue simmering for 45 min.

Yield: 2 1/2 quarts