The Importance of Bone Broth

[Jacques]

I've been making my broth with grass fed beef bones but was wondering if anyone has tried it with goat bones?

Not so far but I have tried it with lamb bones and it was delicious.

Do they give the "lamb/goat" taste to the broth? Because lamb/goat meat is something I usually dislike.

Yes there were a flavor of lamb in the broth.

 

[Deleted member 8431]

I've been making my broth with grass fed beef bones but was wondering if anyone has tried it with goat bones?

Not so far but I have tried it with lamb bones and it was delicious.

Do they give the "lamb/goat" taste to the broth? Because lamb/goat meat is something I usually dislike.

Yes there were a flavor of lamb in the broth.

Allright. Thank you.

 

[Lauranimal]

I too have been having the bone broth almost daily. It's wonderful!!! So far, grass fed beef bones, but I'm excited to try others and grateful for the suggestion to seek out a butcher her services hunters in the area.


I have been including 1 quart of water and one tablespoon of raw apple-cider vinegar per pound of bones.
I saute a big onion and about a hand of garlic in coconut oil and a little bit of tamari, and add this toward the beginning. If I have any veggie trimmings saved in the freezer, I add those too. Balck peppercorns, a bay leaf and I add salt in the last hour of cooking.

Recently, I've made up an antioxidant / immune spice mix that I use when re-heating a daily dose of broth.

6 parts turmeric
3 parts ground cumin
3 parts ground coriander
6 parts ground fennel
1 part powdered dry ginger
1 part ground black pepper
1/4 part ground cinnamon

1. Mix spices together well & store in an airtight container in a cool place away from sunlight.
2. Heat 1 teaspoon of spice mix in one tablespoon of ghee using medium to high heat until the mixture releases a stronger or altered aroma. Remove from the heat immediately so it won't burn.
3. You can put this spiced ghee in or on anything. What I have been doing...
... I take about a teaspoon of the spiced ghee to a small sauce pan, add a clove or 2 of fresh crushed garlic (sometimes a little diced onion, too)... and just when the garlic is beginning to brown just a little, I add the bone broth. As it's heating I add a little fresh cracked black and white pepper, a couple grinds of cracked sesame seeds and maybe a pinch of pink salt depending on if I salted my bonebroth batch enough.

When it comes to a gentle boil, I crack an egg into it and cook for about a minute more. Pour into a soup cup or mug, and let it sit for about 10 minutes (cooks the egg just perfectly! Amazing yoke!) And spend a good half hour eating/drinking it. It's an event! And it feels like such a luxury and a wonderful way to care for myself.

Very much looking forward to trying a different bone next time :) Thanks to all for great suggestions!

 

[Soluna]

I tried to make my first batch of bone broth last night! Unfortunately it coincided with me having a stinker of a sinus headache (I am assuming it was sinus, the right side of my forehead) - so I turned off the oven at around 2 am (8 hours into cooking) because the smells of the cooking and the sound of the oven were aggravating me in my grumpy/headachey state.

I looked up a few recipes, but found conflicting information about what temperature to cook at in an oven - I found 200 C, 135 C and 110 C - all very different. I read that the broth needs to lightly simmer, with the occasional bubble popping to the top - so with some trial and error in my oven I settled on around 140 C.

I only added the very basics, due to not having the best quality ingrediants at hand. I put one of my chicken carcasses, 3 chopped organic garlic cloves and 2 tablespoons of cider vinegar.

I retrieved the mixture when I awoke headache-free, and strained through a metal sieve. Despite having sat in the oven whilst I slept and it cooled, it hadn't thickened very much - perhaps I had used too much water with only 1 chicken carcass, or perhaps I hadn't cooked it for long enough?

So I've put the tub in the fridge to cool properly, and I heated up a mug of the mixture and added a little salt to try it out. It's a little greasy, but that's probably because I haven't let the broth cool and allowed the fat to separate yet - I was eager to try out my first batch. However it is fairly tasty.


If anyone has some advice that could help me improve on this - especially regarding oven temperature and ideal length of cooking depending on the amount you are cooking, I would be grateful to read.

 

[anart]

I saute a big onion and about a hand of garlic in coconut oil and a little bit of tamari

Just a suggestion to never use tamari. It's a glutamate and acts like MSG in the body, plus it's soy based (yes, it's fermented, but still). The last time I had tamari I had a headache for four hours. Also, if you can't give tamari up (it's a bit addictive), it certainly shouldn't be added until the very end lest it slow down extraction of minerals from the bones into the water.

 

[Ollie]

...

I looked up a few recipes, but found conflicting information about what temperature to cook at in an oven - I found 200 C, 135 C and 110 C - all very different. I read that the broth needs to lightly simmer, with the occasional bubble popping to the top - so with some trial and error in my oven I settled on around 140 C.

..

So I've put the tub in the fridge to cool properly, and I heated up a mug of the mixture and added a little salt to try it out. It's a little greasy, but that's probably because I haven't let the broth cool and allowed the fat to separate yet - I was eager to try out my first batch. However it is fairly tasty.


If anyone has some advice that could help me improve on this - especially regarding oven temperature and ideal length of cooking depending on the amount you are cooking, I would be grateful to read.

Using the oven, I have found that 110C is an ideal temperature - the liquid is only just simmering, just a few bubbles coming to the top. As for time, I've found that a minimum of 12hrs works. As for quantity, it is the same, the bones only just need to be covered with water.

Bone broth is generally 'greasy'. :)

This may help or not.

 

[Lauranimal]

I saute a big onion and about a hand of garlic in coconut oil and a little bit of tamari

Just a suggestion to never use tamari. It's a glutamate and acts like MSG in the body, plus it's soy based (yes, it's fermented, but still). The last time I had tamari I had a headache for four hours. Also, if you can't give tamari up (it's a bit addictive), it certainly shouldn't be added until the very end lest it slow down extraction of minerals from the bones into the water.

Thank you Anart. I didn't know that! I always figured that using the organic low sodium gluten free tamari was just fine and dandy! It added a lot of flavor... though now that I'm adding the ghee spice mix when I reheat a mug... I don't think I'll need it.

Gonna try a test. Not that I eat a ton of tamari... but I'll avoid it for a few weeks and then do my favorite mushroom saute and see how it makes me feel. On the rare occasion when I have something from soy... it's almost always organic (IE: pretty much GMO free) and the more fermented the better!

Will update you on my experiment!

 

[shijing]

I recently tried something new with bone broth that I've been enjoying and wanted to share. I've been cooking a chicken or a duck once a week or so; after getting all of the meat off that I can, I put the remaining carcass in the crockpot to simmer in the bone broth overnight. It adds flavor and the remaining meat detaches into the broth, but most importantly the bones also soften up enough to eat (I've been eating all of them). It seems to be a good way to use parts that would otherwise get thrown out.

 

[Gwenllian]

I recently tried something new with bone broth that I've been enjoying and wanted to share. I've been cooking a chicken or a duck once a week or so; after getting all of the meat off that I can, I put the remaining carcass in the crockpot to simmer in the bone broth overnight. It adds flavor and the remaining meat detaches into the broth, but most importantly the bones also soften up enough to eat (I've been eating all of them). It seems to be a good way to use parts that would otherwise get thrown out.

I also made some chicken broth twice (with a soup chicken as we say over here) and it was very gelatineous! It also tastes so much better than my broth made from shank. I will have a go and reuse the bones, Shijing, and see if I can eat them. I will report back.

 

[Goemon_]

There is a fine "Little Butcher" near here.

I had orderer him some lard for last sunday. I want to try to make Lardo di colonnata. He forget. He find me arround 750g from a very not fat pork. He give me the rinds appart + 2 big bones from a cow + a half of the pork's liver + 12 pig's feet. So, I just paid 2€ for the lard and get away with two heavy bags.

I put the liver in a freezer.
I have render the lard in the oven and discovered a good way to eat fat eating the peaces of lard that don't melt (I don't even know how we call that).
And I made broth with the rest, put appart the rinds to experiment craklings (that didn't work so well) and then I have process the broth it in the pressure cooker.

I have take the habit to take the meat out of the broth to control my protein intake. I ended with 4 or 5 portions of meat.

Even if some people comes from far to buy at this country-side little butcher it might not be the best meat arround here.

So I also take some pork's bones from a little producer on the local market but he gives me only few of them (the bigger ones).

If I well undertand what as been said here, We could used every bones for the broth. Or can't we ? If it is so I could ask the producer for some more bones.

Good day, forgiveness, thank you

 

[Gaby]

I also made some chicken broth twice (with a soup chicken as we say over here) and it was very gelatineous! It also tastes so much better than my broth made from shank. I will have a go and reuse the bones, Shijing, and see if I can eat them. I will report back.

I did some too with organic chicken. Its fat was yellow-ish. I mixed it with pig's feet and the flavor was very interesting. It was good.

But my favorite is the cool gelatin made out from pig's feet. I like jello :)

 

[dugdeep]

I recently tried something new with bone broth that I've been enjoying and wanted to share. I've been cooking a chicken or a duck once a week or so; after getting all of the meat off that I can, I put the remaining carcass in the crockpot to simmer in the bone broth overnight. It adds flavor and the remaining meat detaches into the broth, but most importantly the bones also soften up enough to eat (I've been eating all of them). It seems to be a good way to use parts that would otherwise get thrown out.

That's funny - some of the forum members here were just discussing whether the bones, once softened, were something that could, or should, be eaten. I've done so in small amounts, but can't really say I enjoyed the experience much. I imagine it's quite loaded with minerals, though :) Have you noticed any digestion issues with it, Shijing?

 

[shijing]

That's funny - some of the forum members here were just discussing whether the bones, once softened, were something that could, or should, be eaten. I've done so in small amounts, but can't really say I enjoyed the experience much. I imagine it's quite loaded with minerals, though :) Have you noticed any digestion issues with it, Shijing?

No, none that I've noticed at all. By the time I eat the bones, they're usually so soft that they literally crumble into a paste as I chew them. If they're cooked long enough, this can even be true of the beef/pig bones, although I've only experimented with eating the chicken and duck bones so far. I discovered this kind of by accident, when I cooked a chicken and felt like the carcass would be going to waste if I threw it away, so I just dumped it in my crockpot before bed one night figuring it would add some flavor to the broth -- I ladled out some of the bones with the meat the next day, and discovered that they were quite edible. It's true that it's a bit weird if you eat too many at once, but I've found that if you try to include a few with each serving, they get portioned out and it's not too bad once you add the salt and vinegar to the mix.

And yes, the other thing that made sense after reading Deep Nutrition by the Shanahans is that its a good way to get minerals and other goodies directly. They argue that while supplements are better than nothing, its a good idea to try to get vitamins and minerals straight from the source if you can, since they tend to act together synergistically in a way that doesn't happen when you consume them in derived form. I imagine this might be particularly good if you have any issues with (or are at risk for) osteoporosis or other bone-related ailments.

 

[Meager1]

I really don`t like beef bones at all.

I save bones from hams and pork roasts etc, and use those mostly.

Beef bones just seems to taste "sick" or leave the impression in the broth, that the animal was sick, I can`t get beef bones that don`t have that scent/taste of aged sick animal.

Maybe it is just this area and where the beef comes from, I don`t know, but it`s not so good.
Pork bones taste cleaner and are much better, here anyway.

 

[Ollie]

That's funny - some of the forum members here were just discussing whether the bones, once softened, were something that could, or should, be eaten. I've done so in small amounts, but can't really say I enjoyed the experience much. I imagine it's quite loaded with minerals, though :) Have you noticed any digestion issues with it, Shijing?

No, none that I've noticed at all. By the time I eat the bones, they're usually so soft that they literally crumble into a paste as I chew them]. If they're cooked long enough, this can even be true of the beef/pig bones, ....

....

When preparing belly pork for making streaky bacon, I've used the bones and attached meat flat-bladed out as a basis of bone broth. At the end of three-four hours in a pressure cooker, the bones crumble as you take them out of the broth, further pressure to get the marrow out crumbles the bones even further. Using a stick mixer to blend the meat into the broth does the same with most of the bone material. On pouring the broth into a storage vessel, any larger bits of bone are left behind, the rest is incorporated. So far, an absence of digestion problems, and the broth tastes similar to that without bones. :)