People often state that eating a plant-based diet is expensive. It certainly can be if you eat fruit and vegetables out of season or buy convenience items. Most people find it very affordable, given that rice, beans, and oats are quite inexpensive. One way I like to save money and use items I might normally throw away is to make my own vegetable broth. It is possible to find no sodium vegetable broth, but it often costs over four dollars a quart. A simple no cost solution is to collect vegetable scraps that you might normally throw away, such as peals or ends of carrots, mushroom stems, or the stems of spices, and collect them in gallon bags or storage containers and store them in the freezer.
Once I have a sizable amount of veggie scraps, I then make time to cook the broth. This is not the kind of cooking that requires a recipe. I remove all my scraps from the freeze and place them in a large pot with 8 to 10 cups of filtered water. I also add spices, such as bay leaf, dried parsley, or oregano.
You can add whatever spice profile you would like to help flavor your broth. These items will simmer on the stove for 2 to 3 hours extracting all the flavors from the vegetables. Vegetables such as zucchini will not add much flavor to your broth but can certainly add to the vitamin content of your broth. Be careful not to add too many cruciferous vegetables, such as broccoli or cauliflower, as they will add a very distinct flavor to your broth that might be unpleasant. Once you see that your broth color is getting dark, you can strain the liquid from the broth and place it into containers.
I refrigerate the jars I will use in the next few days and others are placed in the freezer for future use. You can freeze the broth in ice cube trays for when they only need a little broth for sauteing items without oil on the stove. Your homemade broth is excellent to use in soups as well as other recipes when the need arises.
