Big Little Recipes
The One-Ingredient Vegetable Stock I Swear By
This week's Big Little Recipe can be swapped in anywhere a recipe calls for vegetable or chicken stock.
A Big Little Recipe has the smallest-possible ingredient list and big everything else: flavor, creativity, wow factor. That means five ingredients or fewer—not including water, salt, black pepper, and certain fats (like oil and butter), since we're guessing you have those covered. This month, we’re sharing sneak peeks from the Big Little Recipes cookbook, all revving up to its release on November 9 (blasts airhorn, throws confetti in the air)
Most vegetable stock recipes call for more than one vegetable. There are onions, carrots, and celery. But also leeks, fennel, and cabbage. Maybe scallions, parsnips, and mushrooms. And yes, I could go on.
But just as chicken stock recipes almost always call for more than just chicken, vegetable stock recipes almost always call for more than just vegetables. Supposedly, you need aromatics (like ginger and garlic), herbs (like parsley and thyme), spices (like black pepper and coriander), and umami boosters (like tomato paste and dried mushrooms).
Except you don’t. You don’t need a laundry list of ingredients. You just need one confident ingredient, plus water and salt.
I tested this a couple years back with chicken and ended up with the chickeniest chicken broth of my life. Then, for my cookbook, Big Little Recipes, I developed even more one-ingredient stocks (seven, to be exact).
Not to pick favorites, but this one is my favorite. It comes together with a couple heads of garlic and an hour on the stove.
While over 20 cloves might seem audacious from afar, it’s the secret to turning a pot of tap water into liquid gold. When raw, garlic is sharp, like lemon juice on a paper cut. But when cooked, it melts into something savory and sweet and magical.
The reason why garlic is often used as a sidekick in stock recipes—which typically call for a mere clove or two—is the same reason why it shines so brightly on its own: Its flavor is powerful. So let’s harness that.
Once the garlic is done simmering, you have a couple options: You could repurpose those mushy cloves toward something else (say, a heavily buttered baguette). Or you could mash them through a fine-mesh strainer to enrich the broth with more garlicky goodness (yes please and thank you).
Use this one-ingredient vegetable stock anywhere a recipe calls for the more traditional sort. Because it yields a couple quarts, you’ll likely have some for now, and more to freeze for later. Which, I’ve found, is enormously welcome come winter.
| 2 | big garlic heads |
| Kosher salt, to taste |
| 2 | big garlic heads |
| Kosher salt, to taste |
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Written by: Emma Laperruque
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10 Comments
I also like saving veggie scraps in a freezer bag and throwing that in the pressure cooker to make stock, too whenever the bag is full (aka garbage stock.)
1. mince 2-3 cloves of garlic (about 2-3 tsp minced)
2. saute garlic in a little bit of oil (any neutral-flavored oil will work), ~1TB. Cook until it starts to brown, but don't burn it. If it burns, start over again.
3. Add water (how much is up to you)
That's it. Proceed with your soup recipe and season however you like.
If you want a hot & sour soup, add 1 golf ball lump of tamarind and let it soften as the broth comes to a boil. Scoop out the tamarind into a small bowl, along with a few TB of the broth. Gently mash to make a tamarind water. Pour the tamarind water back into the garlic broth. Discard the seeds and fibers of the tamarind. Proceed with the soup recipe.
For a basic soup, season with either salt and/or fish sauce. Optional: pinch of black pepper.
This garlic broth was how all my mother's cooking would start.
I'm always looking for ways to coax more flavor out of eventually composted but still useful scraps (see https://food52.com/blog/13959-over-30-recipes-to-put-herb-stems-to-good-use).
This would be the perfect way to repurpose the skins from roasted garlic. I'll pop those babies into the freezer until ready to use in this stock, along with the fresh garlic recommended here. I cannot wait to try it, both with and without the roasted garlic. Stay tuned. ;o)
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