Bringing out rich flavor in a vegetable dish can be a challenge. Vegetables are often cooked with bacon or pancetta, soups are made with chicken stock, split pea soup or beans are cooked with a ham bone. How can we go to flavortown without using meat?

One good way is with a base of a good vegetable stock and if you reduce it down you can get a little more flavor out of it. Are there any ways to get even more flavor out of the vegetable stock? Yes, roast the vegetables first! By browning and caramelizing the vegetables first you coax out some more sugar and darkening it brings out a deeper richness. Picking the right vegetables is also important in getting good flavor from your stock. Mirepoix – a mix of 2 parts onion, one part each of carrots and celery is a great start, add a few other items like the delicate fragrance of leeks, sweetness of parsnips and celery root and what else? Mushrooms cover a flavor less known, umami , which is pleasantly savory and meaty. Roasting the mushrooms gets an even more complex flavor out of them as well as more dark color. Tomatoes also help with richer darker sweet flavor and color.

You don’t have to cook your vegetable stock very long – one hour is usually sufficient to get the flavors out and longer can actually make your stock slightly bitter. The stock recipes don’t call for salt so you can reduce them down and make them richer and more concentrated. The flavor may seem a little light but if you take a sample and add a little salt you will realize the flavors right away.

It does take some work to coax out the flavors in this version as you have to chop your vegetables small and roast them to get good color. It also takes twice as much vegetables because you loose a lot of volume when you roast them. Luckily onions, carrots and celery are pretty affordable.