Once you see just how easy and affordable it is to make homemade vegetable broth, and the amazing flavor this broth adds to soups, rice, and beans, you’ll be addicted to stocking your freezer with this liquid gold.
Each time you prepare vegetables, reserve the scraps in a baggie or container. This baggie or container may be kept in the freezer until you have enough scraps (3-4 cups worth) to make broth. Examples of scraps, include: onion skins, leftover onion slices, mushroom stems, ends of potatoes, celery pieces or leaves, ends of carrots, peeled carrot pieces, garlic ends, bell pepper ends and seeds, leeks, leftover green onions, and squash or zucchini pieces.
Add the veggie scraps to your crock-pot, then fill the crock-pot with water (this is about 10 cups of water in my crock-pot). Add the optional add-in ingredients, if using. Cook the broth on low for 10-12 hours, or on high for 4-6 hours.
Strain the vegetable broth from the "lifeless" veggies. Discard or compost the veggies. Store the broth in the fridge for up to 1 week, or up to 6 months in the freezer. I freeze my broth in quart-size, wide-mouth mason jars (leave about 2 inches of room at the top of the jar for expansion, and only freeze cooled broth), or ice cube trays (and then store the frozen broth cubes in a baggie).