Back in February, I mentioned that I would like to try cooking a broth with veggie scraps. Well, I finally got round to it! We’re no strangers to veggie broths by any means as I regularly make chicken broth for us, but while I usually use whole vegetables such as carrots, onions, celery and parsnips, this time I made a lovely broth with lamb bones and veggie scraps.
First of all, let’s talk about the ‘scraps’ and what exactly are those ‘scraps’? In a nutshell, those are little bits and pieces of certain vegetables that you’d otherwise throw away but which are still perfectly edible and thus usable, and of course, washed clean. It could be the very bottom of a cauliflower stem or tomato and green pepper ‘tops’ or perhaps a bit of an onion peel if you’d peeled the onion a bit too much and it was no longer ‘whole’ enough to be chopped finely.
So instead of simply throwing all of those veggie scraps into the compost bin, I started collecting the edible and washed bits and pieces in a bag in the freezer and I’ve been adding to it ever since: cauliflower stems, a bit of zucchini peels and fleshy bits, tomato tops (without the green stems), red pepper tops (again, without the green stems), some onion, celery and carrot bits. I had probably collected over 1kg of scraps over the last two months which really just convinced me even more of how much food does indeed get wasted in our kitchens.
Back in February, I also purchased a 2.5 kg pack of lamb which, although not cheap, was cheaper because it was on special for about R130.00, if memory serves me well. I used the meat in 3 different meals which I had cooked for us in bulk and which have lasted us for quite some time. When we brought the shopping home that day, I chopped up the meat to prepare for cooking but I’d kept the bones aside in the freezer and that’s what I used in the broth today.
Ingredients:
500 gr. Lamb bones
3 whole Garlic cloves
3 Carrots
1 Onion
3 Vegetable stock cubes
(Or use 2-3 Tbsp. Aromat)
A few whole peppercorns
Freshly chopped Parsley to taste
Salt to taste
Veggie scraps:
Cauliflower stems
Zucchini peels and fleshy bits
Tomato tops (without the green stems)
Red pepper tops (without the green stems)
Onion, celery and carrot bits
Noodles
(optional)
Method:
Put all the ingredients in a large stock pot (the one I used is 7 litres) and top with 4-5 litres of cold water. Bring to the boil then simmer for just over an hour. Strain your broth through a fine-mesh sieve, adjust salt and pepper to taste and voila, the broth is ready!
I chopped up the carrots into small pieces and removed all the meat off the bones and chopped those up into small pieces as well. Those are the only 2 ingredients that I’d put back into the broth (you can skip this if you are planning on using the broth as stock addition to other meals).
Just before serving, we like to add noodles (broken up into smaller pieces) into the broth and allow it to simmer for about 10 minutes, or until the noodles are cooked.
This broth is delicious on its own though and it freezes very well. It can also be a great addition when cooking stews or any other dish which requires you to use stock. Enjoy!
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