Bone Broth: Are You Enjoying This Wonderful, Warming Comfort Food This Winter?
Bone broth is a nourishing, grounding and comforting food. Simple, timeless and inexpensive to make. It’s been prepared for centuries by our ancestors, dating back to time when the first pot was made. As you probably know by now bone broth is suddenly very trendy again and being touting in many places as some kind of superfood. While I may not agree with many of the new products that have sprung up, I do think it’s a healthy nutritious staple food that everyone should try to include as part of their regular diet. You can use the broth for soups, stews or drink it straight. I prepare this in bulk and freeze it so it’s ready to use when ever needed.
Why Should You Drink Bone Broth?
Bone broth has been reported to help with a range of conditions from digestive problems and boosting the immune system to improving osteoarthritis and protecting the joints. It’s said to improve connective tissue and so reduce cellulite, encourage hair and nail growth and aid in sleep. Unfortunately, as with much food-based therapy, there has been little extensive research done into benefits of the bone broth. From my personal experience its very helpful in reducing inflammation, giving me greater joint mobility and I find it helps my digestion. Bone broth features prominently in the Paleo diet, the Keto Diet and also in GAPS diet, which has been very popular with parents of children with a myriad of conditions.
Bone broth has been reported to help with a range of conditions from digestive problems and boosting the immune system to improving osteoarthritis and protecting the joints. It’s said to improve connective tissue and so reduce cellulite, encourage hair and nail growth, and aid in sleep. Unfortunately, as with much food-based therapy, there has been little extensive research done into the benefits of bone broth. From my personal experience, it’s very helpful in reducing inflammation, giving me greater joint mobility and I find it helps my digestion. Bone broth features prominently in the Paleo diet, the Keto Diet, and also in the GAPS diet, which has been very popular with parents of children with a myriad of conditions.
How to Make Bone Broth
While you can make bone broth from chicken, lamb, pork and veal, my favorite recipe uses beef bones. This recipe is from Sally Fallon Morell and Kaayla T. Daniel’s book “Nourishing Broth”. For more nourishing broth recipes, I highly recommend Hilary Boynton and Mary Brackett’s new GAPS cookbook, The Heal Your Gut Cookbook: Nutrient-Dense Recipes for Intestinal Health Using the GAPS Diet. There are links to the books on Amazon below and I will be publishing more nutrition recipes from this book in coming weeks.
As the recipes recommends, I like to use several sorts of bones to give the best combination of knuckle bones to produce the largest amount of collagen, marrow bones for flavor and nutrients and meaty ribs or shanks for flavor and color.
Ingredients
• 4 lbs of beef marrow and knuckle bones
• 1 calf, beef, or pig foot, preferably cut into pieces
• 3 lbs meaty bones such as short ribs and beef shanks
• 1 small can or jar tomato paste (optional)
• 4 or more quarts cold filtered water
• 1/2 cup Apple Cider Vinegar
• 3 onions, ends removed and coarsely chopped (skin may be left on)
• 3 carrots, peeled and coarsely chopped
• 3 celery sticks, coarsely chopped
• 1 bouquet garni made with parsley sprigs, thyme sprigs, and bay leaf, tied together
• 1 tablespoon black peppercorns, or green or white peppercorns, crushed
• Optional – I also like to include dried shiitake mushrooms. These have been used for centuries for boosting the immune system and they have an intense meaty flavor I believe adds to the broth.
Directions
1. Place the knuckle and marrow bones and optional calves foot in a very large pot, toss with vinegar and cover with cold water. Let stand for 1/2 to 1 hour.
2. While that is standing, set the oven to 350 degrees and place the meaty bones in a stainless steel roasting pan. For a particularly aromatic stock, brush the bones with tomato paste. Brown in the oven for about ½ hour.
3. When well browned, add these bones to the pot. Pour the fat out of the roasting pan, add cold filtered water to the pan, set over a high flame and bring to a boil, stirring with a wooden spoon to loosen up coagulated juices. Add this liquid to the pot. Add additional water, if necessary, to cover the bones; but the liquid should come no higher than within one inch of the rim of the pot, as the volume expands slightly during cooking.
4. Bring to a simmer and carefully skim any scum that comes to the top. After you have skimmed, add the vegetables, bouquet garni, and peppercorns.
5. Simmer stock for at least 12 and as long as 24 hours.
6. Remove bones with tongs or a slotted spoon. Strain the stock into a large bowl or several 2-quart Pyrex measuring cups. Let cool in the refrigerator and remove the congealed fat that rises to the top. Transfer to smaller containers and to the freezer for long-term storage.
In Conclusion
So there you have it, a simple, timeless recipe to prepare this nutritious broth. I hope you have enjoyed this and decide to give it try soon. Please feel free to share this post with family and friends and to leave any comments or questions in the box below. I will be regularly posting healthy, easy to prepare recipes that I cook at home for my family. If you would like to be informed when a new recipe is posted please sign up for our OptimaEarth Newsletter below.
Resources
The follow-up book to the hugely best-selling Nourishing Traditions, which has sold over 500,000 copies, this time focusing on the immense health benefits of bone broth by the founder of the popular Weston A Price Foundation, Click Here to Buy on Amazon
With more than two hundred straightforward, nutrient-dense, and appealing recipes, The Heal Your Gut Cookbook was created by GAPS Diet experts Hilary Boynton and Mary G. Brackett to help heal your gut and to manage the illnesses that stem from it. Click Here to Buy on Amazon
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