Hi all! I have a question about food preservation.
TLDR: I want to preserve veggie broth in jars. I need help with how to do that.
For context, I have been making my scrap broth from vegetable peels and trimmings for several years. My go to method is to collect the bits and edges in freezer safe 0.5 or 1 liter container in the freezer, and when I have enough for a big pot, I boil them with 2 times the volume of water (that is two liters of water for every one liter container stuffed full), some herbs&spices, and one teaspoon of salt for every liter.of water. (Sorry, I'm continental European so I calculate in metrics; also my teaspoon is a literal teaspoon from my cutlery drawer, and not an American volume unit teaspoon). Various internet recipes tell you various cooking times for this scrap broth, my tried and tested method is to boil for one hour, half covered and half uncovered. (Unlike bone broth that you can boil for however long you want, veggie broth loses aromas after lengthy boiling.) After it cooled a bit, I strain the stuff ,throw out the solids and reboil the broth. In a 5*C fridge , it survives 4-6 days, but in freezing adjacent temperatures, I can keep it outside on the balcony for as long as 10 days without spoiling. What doesn't get used in this timeframe, goes into the freezer in containers and gets used eventually. This broth is too concentrated to drink from a cup; I dilute with some water (around 1:1 usually), when I make soup, but I use it directly for risotto, couscous, stews and some other stuff.
As for food preservation, I don't have a canner or any pro tools, butI have some positive experience with jam, syrup or chutney. My method (that's what my grandma did with all her jams) is washing the jars and screwon lids thoroughly (you can use repurposed jars from whatever store bought). Then you put them all into a baking pan, fill the pan with water and put it in the oven to heat up the jars (this way, they're less likely to break). Then, you scoop/funnel in the piping hot jam/syrup/etc. You close the jars/bottles with their store bought lid, then you set them upside down for 5 minutes to create vacuum. Then you place the still hot jars in a bin lined with blankets, and let them cool down slowly for several days. The upcoming product may keep from several months to several years. You do not need to use any preservative for this.
So.back to my current problem. I have to move to a place where I have limited freezer space. Also, I first need to clear my freezer at the prev place. So I need to save the broth from my current deposits without the option of freezing the finished product. My oncoming broth sessions will follow the same pattern, too. So basically, I'm supposed to find a way to jar preserve broth instead.of freezing it.
Recently, I got an advice to cut the water in half and keep the salt content. This way the salt content can work as a natural preservative, and all I have to do is to dilute it with more water. Tbh, 1+ year ago, I had a limited freezer space, so I contrentated my broth into about 75% of it's previous volume, then diluted it according to my needs, and it worked. So my main question is, how do i make my veggie broth and preserve it without a freezer? My plan is to clean the jars (detergent,.then heating in the oven), make a moderately concentrated broth ,store it away in the jars while it's hot, let the jars cool.off ij a blanket for a few days, then keep them jars safe for future use. Do I meed to look for anything?
Also, thank you if you have read everything I've written stoned af after a shitty restaurant shift kudos to you. If you have only read the main points, i still need to know what to do with my broth.
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