Cookaholics Bulletin Board

My name is Tim Granzeau and I am a stockaholic. I went to the dark side a few weeks ago and actually purchased stock in a grocery store.

It was salt-free beef stock made from a vegetable stock base. (Italian beef was demanded and I had no real stock.) It actually tasted really good. Can you put me out of my misery and tell me by taste buds have been corrupted?

It turns out they even have chicken stock without salt...my synapses are snapping and I don't know what to think. Is there a twelve-step recovery process available to me?

cc

Is this a ploy to try to get me to relent my bean position?

Tim, I feel your pain. I always have many different kinds of homemade stock on hand (chicken, veal, seafood, lobster, goose, etc) I do not have beef - it is way too expensive to make or maybe I don't have an economical recipe. Rachael Ray's beef stock is very well rated. I also always have chicken stock - store bought - on hand. If I am making something that only uses chicken, such as chicken corn soup, I will use homemade. In a stew or something highly seasoned, I will use store bought.
It must have taken great courage to come clean. Congratulations!
Kathy

Come clean! Like Anna and Edith, I feel defiled...

cc

Hah! I buy chicken broth by the gallon! TJ's low-sodium organic, to be exact. I probably use 15-20 quarts per month in the winter.

Tim, what was the brand?

Lindsay,

It was Kitchen Basics. Not one person responded to Anna and Edith; what happened in the past year?
Tim

Tim,

I use Savory Choice's vegetarian instastock a lot. While homemade would be better, I just don't have the freezer space. And the nice thing about the instastock is that I can make just one cup if that's all I need.

I find the Kitchen Basics brand to be better than most, but I also stock up at Costco on their organic low sodium chicken broth (it's labeled "free range broth" but I don't see how broth can roam very far). I lost my source for chicken backs/necks and just don't want to buy that many chickens just to make stock, and despite Ruhlman's and Keller's stern lectures on the subject, for most applications boxed broth works ok for me. Guess I'm never going to get a job at the French Laundry.

Discovering that there is a viable alternative to a freezer full of bones and finished stock without significantly affecting the outcome of a recipe is movement up a path toward the light and enlightenment.

Those of us who are still on speaking terms with C@*& K&M4a(l have probably even embraced the D+#&$D D$%N and scandalous tricks of bolstering the flavor of commercial stock with with ground meat and gelatin. OMG WWJS