Making Stock Investments

Home made stock is the biggest "Professional Chef" trick to great tasting food that has the depth of flavor that many home cooks cannot achieve.  Lets demystify how to make stock at home and get you the essential ingredients to making better tasting food.
Tools:
Big stock pot (a stock pot is a pot that has 2 handles and straight sides)

Chicken, Beef or Pork Bones and Scraps
     Note:  I keep a large zip-lock bag in my freezer, every time I roast a chicken I save the bones, skin and scrap and throw it into the bag.  You can do the same with other kinds of meat.  Start a freezer bag for veggie scraps.  When a bag if full it is time to start making stock.

Water (use cold water, the stock will come to a simmer more slowly allowing the bones to open up their "pores" and give off the most flavor.  They will also be able to release more of their blood and other impurities)

Ladle

To start your stock simply dump all those tasty scraps that you have collected over the last month into a big pot.  Make sure there is some onions, carrots and celery in the pot (2 handfuls of each is plenty)  Add water, there should be 3" of water over the top of the bones.  Now simply turn your stove the a low setting and wait it out.

Once you have reached a simmer you will notice a grey muck that will rise to the top.  This is the blood and impurities that I mentioned.  Simply scoop it off the top with a ladle.

Adjust your stove to find a low simmer.  Your stock should bubble about once every second.  Imagine a story book bog when the green pond bubbles slowly.  That what it should look like.  Almost like it is laboring to send another bubble to the surface.  Never boil your stock.  This will force all that fat to get mixed in and make a very cloudy stock.

After 2 hours for veggie stock, 6 hours for chicken stock, and 10+ hours for beef stock it is time to strain it.  Start by dumping it through a colander to remove all the big pieces.  Then stain it through a fine mesh sieve.  Transfer it back into your metal pot.  Fill your kitchen sink with cold water and some ice.  Set the pot into your ice bath and stir every 15 min until it is cold.   Drain the water and start with fresh cold water and ice if you notice your ice bath feels more like a bath tub.  Using your ladle scoop off the fat that has risen to the top.  What you are doing by quickly cooling it is preventing bacteria from gowning.  The metal pot will conduct cold much faster than plastic.  I must admit, when it is very cold here in Chicago I simply place the whole pot on my balcony and cool it in the snow.

Transfer stock into 1qt plastic containers (like the kind you get at the deli), vacuum seal it into 1 qt pouches or make something chefs call Glace.  It is reduced super potent stock that you can use as a last minute flavor inhancer.  Simply put your strained stock back on the stove and reduce it until it gets a slightly syrupy consistancy.  Be very careful not to burn it or scorch the edges of the pot as it reduces.  If you notice the sides of the pot are geting a dark brown ring, wash down the pan using a pastry brush (or clean, natural brissle paint brush) and paint the browning part on the walls of the pan with clean water.  Once your glace is fully reduced freeze it in ice cube trays (then pop out and store in zip-lock bag).  This is ultra potent stock and you can use a small amout at the end of the cooking process to give your dish a boost or you can reconstitue it in water and use it as you would stock.  Do not make glace out of veggie stock.  Use refridgerated stock within 5 days, frozen stock within 6 months and glace can be kept almost forever.

Notes:
I do not know much about crock pots seeing as I don't own one or cook with one in the restaurant, but I imagine that you could make stock using one.  Just find that happy setting that allows it to slowly simmer all day while you are are work or all night while you sleep.

Check your groceries meat department or your local butcher for buying "soup bones" or bones for stock.  They should be inexpensive
If you do not have home make stock I wont judge you.  Here is a list from best to worst options.
-Boxed broth (only buy the low sodium kind, this way you can adjust the seasoning),
-Canned Broth (same as boxed but less concern with chemicals leaching from the can, plus the boxed kind you can keep open in the fridge)
-Base (I only buy "Better than Bouillon", it is made with real meat and juices and must be kept refrigerated.   You will find it by the other bouillons).
-Powdered Bouillon
-Bouillon Cubes, these are nothing more than artificially flavored chicken salt licks.

Unless you are making a ton of stock all the time, you will not have enough to use it every time you need stock.  So pick your battles.  Use  the homemade stuff when you are making soup, braising meats, making a pan sauce.  Don't use it when you are making something that has cream of mushroom soup (this stuff is gross, full of sodium and over used by home cooks.  You will NEVER see it used in any self respecting restaurant.  You will never see me use it.  I promise to teach you how to make Bechamel, which is the classic, original, delicious version of it.)