A recipe on how to make a quick and easy vegetable stock in the pressure cooker in under half an hour

“But soups made at home never taste the same as what we have in a restaurant!”

I’m sure you have also pondered over this

One – we never have the heart to add as much cream or butter as a restaurant does

Two – and this is the key reason, it’s all in the STOCK. This holds true for soups with more water content such as broths, than thick creamy soups

Stock (in non-financial parlance) is a liquid with the extract of flavours from vegetables, bones, meat, seafood. When used as a base for soups, sauces, curries and cooking any grains or risottos, it adds immense flavour to your dish, leaving one wondering, what IS the secret ingredient in this dish?

Most soup recipes will say, “Add water OR stock” and we happily reach for water. Or may be a ready stock cube. Very late in my cooking life did I realise that Maggi’s Magic Cubes are in fact stock cubes. These are also called bouillon cubes or cooking base or OXO cubes

It’s okay to use them when you want to add some flavour to your dish and you have absolutely no time. But when all a veg stock needs is some roughly chopped veggies and a large pot of water, it is a sin not to make it at home yourself. While some say, a stock is a great way to use up wilted veggies, I beg to differ. If you want a stock with maximum flavour, then use the best quality ingredients. Master Stock in Chinese cooking, used for poaching meats is made using soy sauce, ginger, garlic, herbs etc

5 uses for a vegetarian stock:

As a base for soup

To cook a pulao

To cook risotto

Healthy stir frying with very little oil and some stock

To thin out dals and curries

There are 3 ways in which you can prepare a veg stock

The common method is to add the vegetables and aromatics to a large pot, bring to a boil and allow to simmer for one hour or so

I love this idea for a 10 minute vegetable stock where you start with the basic aromatics like onion, garlic, bay leaves and pepper corns and keep throwing in veggie scraps while you are prepping the vegetables on the side, for the dish you are making- soup, for example

The third and superfast method is one using a pressure cooker. Since in most Indian kitchens, the pressure cooker is always hovering around the hob, why not give it a try? You have nothing more to lose than a few scraps of veggies and ten minutes of your time

If you are a regular reader of my blog, you’ll know how often I rave about the humble pressure cooker. It cooks dal, curries, rice in minutes. I have even cooked rice for surprise guests when seated at the dining table, and served them steaming hot rice in minutes, thanks to this baby

The basic premise of a pressure cooker is that it cooks super fast and extracts maximum flavour in the shortest possible time. The same should work for a stock as well, right? Kenji from the FoodLab at Serious Eats tested out three chicken stocks, one made on the stove top, one in the pressure cooker and one in the slow cooker and the pressure cooker won the test by a small margin over the stove top method. So I’m all the more convinced!

RECIPE for Vegetable Stock / Veg Stock / Vegetarian Stock

Time taken – Under 30 minutes in all

Makes – 4+ cups / 1 Litre++

To make a basic vegetable stock in the pressure cooker, you need:

A pressure cooker (5 Litre capacity should be good, or smaller one for making smaller quantities)

1 Litre plus 1 cup of water

1 large onion

2 large cloves garlic

1 carrot

2 ribs of celery

Few pieces of dried mushrooms (optional)

2 bay leaves

handful of parsley with stems or coriander

3 cups of mixed vegetable scraps such as broccoli / cauliflower stems, salad greens, leek greens or spring onions, any gourds / squashes etc

2 tsp olive oil

Directions

No need to peel the onion if it is clean. Or else, peel and quarter it

Smash the garlic with the peel

Scrub carrot well and chop in large chunks

Slice the celery

Place the oil in the cooker. Add the bay leaves, onion, garlic, carrot, celery and any other veggies being used. On a high flame, saute them for 1-2 minutes. Add the water. Bring to a boil

Cover the cooker with its lid and the weight. Allow to come to full pressure (one whistle) and then lower the heat to minimum for 10 minutes

Switch off the flame and allow to cool before opening the cooker

Drain the stock out using a mesh and press with with the back of a ladle to extract all the stock

Use immediately or refrigerate for 3 days or freeze for 3 months. You can use this Ice-tray Kitchen Hack for saving stock cubes in ziploc bags in freezer and using in any dish you need in a jiffy

This recipe is part of the endeavor to create a collection of recipes of Indian Chinese Recipes in collaboration with a few bloggers who share the same passion of cooking. All the recipes from #thekitchendivas are pinned on this Pinterest board

Other Indo-Chinese recipes this week from #thekitchendivas

Oriental Crispy Mushrooms from WhiskAffair

American Chopsuey from Sinamon Tales

Veg Manchurian with Fried Rice from FunFoodFrolic

Chinese Noodle Soup from Archana’s Kitchen

(c) Nandita Iyer 2006-2015