Veggie "chicken" broth

We're not red meat eaters at my house. I was raised by a vegan but married a man that probably would have eaten the family pet if hungry enough. So we do eat dairy, chicken, fish etc. But these days we're trying to reduce out the amount of meat we eat for a lot of reasons, moral and carbon foot print being two of them.

Let me share my final secret ingredient here for a successful vegetable broth that looks like chicken broth and tastes rich and wonderful.  Olive oil! Yes, with olive oil in your vegetable broth and you won’t miss the chicken!

Roasted vegetable broth

Ingredients

• 1 pound celery
• 1 1/2 pounds sweet onions
• 1 pound carrots, cut into 1 inch pieces
• 1 pound tomatoes, cored
• 1 pound green bell pepper, cut into 1 inch pieces
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1 bay leaf
• 6 whole black peppercorns
• 1 bunch fresh parsley, chopped
• 1 gallon water

Directions

1.    Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

2.    Remove leaves and tender inner parts of celery and set aside.

3.    Toss onions, carrots, tomatoes, bell peppers with olive oil. Place vegetables in a roasting pan and place them in the hot oven. Stir the vegetables every 15-20 minutes. Cook until all of the vegetables have browned and the onions start to caramelize, this will take about one hour.

4.    Put the browned vegetables, celery, garlic, cloves, bay leaf, pepper corns, Italian parsley and water into a large stock pot. Bring to a full boil. Reduce heat to simmer. Cook uncovered until liquid is reduced by half.

5.    Pour the broth through a colander, catching the broth in a large bowl or pot. The liquid caught in the bowl or pot is your vegetable broth it can be used immediately or stored for later use.