— MaryEllen Bunce

Okay, so the first one regarding stock production from the accumulation of scraps, right? Cut pieces that one accumulates. I think this is a smart way to go. This idea of the frugal kitchen, right? Cooking frugally, but even more generally, just living frugally is a really smart way to go, in my opinion. But when it comes to making stock, we keep scraps in the freezer. And then when we have a quantity that's sufficient to make a batch of stock that we're planning on, then we go forth. And I think that's probably the number one tip that I would share is to keep those scraps freshest longest, do keep them in the freezer, unless you find yourself in a very sort of a short cycle of making stock, let's say on a weekly basis, then you can certainly keep those scraps in the refrigerator. But, you know, certainly any scraps that you might use in a stock should also be things that you're willing to put in your mouth and eat if you had to, okay. So nothing should be of a B rate to, you know, going into your stock, all right? And then otherwise, you know, start with the ratios that we recommend, you know, with, you know, whether it's, you know, mirepoix, or, you know other ingredients. And then experiment from there. It really is up to you. The beauty of cooking is once you learn the fundamentals, right, that we teach you, then you have control. And you can make changes and you can call it your own at that point. So if you wanna, you know, decrease the celery because you want less of that grassy vegetable flavor and some of that bitterness, and you wanna, you know, enhance more the sweetness from the onions and the carrots, then make that adjustment. If you want to put in garlic, if you want to put in some, you know, some star anise and some kaffir lime, because you want to take it to a Southeast Asian flavor profile, then, you know, you can do all of those things. But learn the rules first and then have fun with it.