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Homemade Vegetable Broth in a Slow Cooker

slow cooker

I have been making my own chicken broth and Homemade Vegetable Broth in a Slow Cooker for years now.  If you cook with broth often, making your own is practically free, really easy, and makes the environment happy!  I shared how to make your own chicken broth in the slow cooker already, but I thought it was high time I shared about Homemade Vegetable Broth in a Slow Cooker. I honestly don’t know how people live without a crock pot or slow cooker – it saves so much time and money!

Veggie broth is really easy to make in a slow cooker!

Step one : Save vegetable scraps.  You can save over time or one big group meal (think Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc) can sometimes provide enough.  I simply put scraps in a large ziploc bag and put in the freezer.

Veggies I use….

* Tops, bottoms, and skins of carrots

* Celery tops and roots

* Potato Skins

* Onion skins and scraps

* Garlic scraps

*Veggies that are bit limp (typically a couple carrots and celery pieces are really OK, but just not crisp anymore.  I used to throw these out – silly me!)

Once the bag is full – it is time to make broth – and it is so easy peasy!

Step two : Empty the veggie scraps into your slow cooker.  Fill the slow cooker with water.  Put on low for 8 hours.  Walk away and do something fun.  When you wander back into the kitchen in 8ish hours you will have a whole slow cooker full of practically free broth!  Simply separate and toss the veggies.  I freeze most of the broth – it lasts for me for several months in the freezer (although I tend to use it up fairly quickly).  I put one container in the fridge, only if I can use it within the week – I am not sure if it will last much longer than that in the fridge.  I have found this broth to be much richer than store bought broth so I don’t really need to use as much of it as I used to. Bonus!

If you are looking to stretch your food budget a little bit or trying to be a little ‘greener’ this year – I think Homemade Vegetable Broth in a Slow Cooker is a great way to do it! We use vegetable stock in lots of recipes so we easily save $10 a month making our own.  As for being more environmentally friendly; we always recycled cans, but this doesn’t take any cans at all – we use BPA free reusable containers over and over again.  It’s a little thing that I feel makes a little difference for us as a family and for the environment – win win!

Do you make your own broth? Do you have a different method? Do you put other ingredients in? I would love to hear more thoughts in the comment section!

Until Next Time ~ Kate
Categories:  Food, Recipes, Slow Cooker
  1. Jane says:

    Looks easy and cheap! thanks!

  2. alice says:

    Yay another use for my crock pot!

  3. Cindy H says:

    This is great. No hidden ingredients.

  4. Dinah G says:

    Thank you!

  5. Lalita Malone says:

    Great idea to use all veggie base. I have used the canned stuff for far too long! Thanks for sharing, Kate!

    • Kate says:

      Lalita – you will be thrilled with how much yummier it is too! I love it when easy stuff saves money and is ‘green’ – you are totally welcome – share with a friend!

  6. Kristene Hanson says:

    Printing this one out. Sounds great!

  7. Lisa says:

    Wow! This is a great idea. I’m going to start doing this!

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  10. Rust says:

    I’ve been making my own chicken and veggie broth for years too, and I really believe the health benefits for my family are huge.

  11. […] another fun way to reuse scraps?  We love to make our own veggie broth from veggie scraps in our slow cooker.  After we’ve made our delicious and practically free broth, the scraps go into the […]

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