I’ve told you before, I’m a bit nuts about making broth. I wasn’t always that way but just kind of evolved, as I shared in my chicken stock post. I am just as nuts about beef stock as I am about chicken, except maybe a bit more even since it took me longer to be successful making the beef broth. When I was dating my husband, he had me over to his house and made us a wonderful T-bone steak dinner. To his surprise, I objected to him throwing away those meaty T-bones when we were done with them. He found it quite odd, actually (this would be the first time of many), I don’t think anyone else he’d dated had ever cared about the beef bones. This is the man that still believes that Beef = Love!
A few posts ago I made chicken stock, and this week I made beef stock. Beef stock is not hard to make either, but has an extra step in it and can take longer to make. It is not actively time consuming though, although it could be sitting on your stove for a few days.
I would say that it’s very worth making your own beef stock. There is such a huge difference between the beef stock that you can buy, and the stock that you make, it’s not even funny. And when you cook it for a few days, the bones end up soft and all of those minerals go into the broth. It can be intensely satisfying to drink just a cup of broth, especially if your body is low on minerals. Times when I’ve felt run down especially in the winter I’ve made beef stock instead of taking vitamins. I’ve found that my body seems to respond to ‘food vitamins’ better, which I guess makes sense since that’s how we were made to take in our vitamins.
People that don’t typically eat a lot of beef will potentially do really well with a bit of meat in beef stock, or just beef broth alone. All of the minerals and gelatin in the stock help the body digest meat more efficiently. It’s a great thing for those that are vegetarians that are trying to start back on an omnivore’s diet.
The first time I made beef stock, it wasn’t good and didn’t become brown enough, but was an insipid beige color. The second time I made it, it didn’t gell. It’s amazing that I tried again, but I guess it made success all the more sweet. Here are some tips to increase your success.
- Try to use several types of bones. These can be bought from your butcher pretty cheaply. Grass-fed beef is better, but don’t stress too much about it, better to get the basics down first.
- always brown your meaty bones really well on both sides before putting them into the pot. This step is the most important.
- throw any leftover meat in the pot, or save to cut up and put in soup. If you cook it into the stock, you won’t be able to eat it in the soup, because all of the flavor will be simmered out of it.
- Save bits of meat in a bag in the freezer to add to the stockpot. Label your bag though so you know what it is for!
- My husband hates this one, but don’t give your dogs your beef bones until you’re done making broth out of them.
- Do NOT skip the vinegar step, it draws the minerals out of the bones
- Freeze your carrot, garlic, onion and celery trimmings in a bag, and add to the pot
- Let the pot sit for longer than you think is possible, it will be fine over 2 or even 3 days. Turn the stove off at night if you want and then turn it back on in the morning.
- If you don’t like the flavor of your broth, don’t worry, just simmer it longer, maybe leaving the lid off if it’s too pale. Once it reduces, you can see what the flavor is really like and then add some celtic sea salt to bring out the flavors.
Grass-Fed Beef Stock
Beef Stock gets 4 forks!
Rating: 4 forks (key)
Even my husband who dislikes soups and stews eats this broth in things and likes it
Difficulty:
Easy
Page in NT: 122
Ingredients:
4 pounds of beef marrow, knuckle bones, bits of leftover beef
3 pounds meaty rib or neck bones
4 or more quarts cold water
1/2 cup vinegar
3 onions, coarsely chopped (or your bag of collected frozen onion parts)
3 carrots coarsely chopped (I omit this sometimes)
3 celery sticks, coarsely chopped (I omit this if I don’t have celery)
Preparation:
Place all of your bones that have meaty bits on them on a large cookie sheet or roasting pan and brown in the oven at 350 degrees until well-browned (30-60 minutes usually). Meanwhile, throw all of your non-meaty marrow bones into a pot, add the water, vinegar and vegetables. Let sit while the other bones are browning. Â Add the browned bones to the pot, deglaze your roasting pan with hot water and get up all of the brown bits, pour this liquid into the pot. Â Add additional water if needed to cover the bones. Bring to a boil and remove the scum/foam that rises to the top. No need to remove the floating fat. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for at least 12 hours and as long as 72 hours. The longer you cook the stock, the more rich and flavorful it will be.
Sally now says this in the recipe which I love because it’s so true: “You will now have a pot of rather repulsive-looking brown liquid containing globs of gelantinous and fatty material. It doesn’t even smell particularly good. But don’t despair. After straining you will have a delicious and nourishing clear broths that forms the basis for many other recipes in this book.”
Remove the bones with a slotted spoon and/or tongs. Strain the stock into a large bowl, then ladle into mason jars. Let the jars sit until they are pretty cool, then freeze or refrigerate. You can remove the congealed fat after refrigerating or even freezing, if you want to reduce it a step.
Note: save the marrow from the bones too for a few recipes in the book!
Variation: this same technique can be used to prepare lamb or venison stock.
Photo courtesy of islandvittles on Flickr
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Kim! I just wanted to write to say what a great idea this blog is. I just finished watching “Julie and Julia.” At first I was totally inspired but then my thoughts went immediately to, “But I could never Master the Art of French Cooking. I’d have to soak all my grains first!” I did a search that led me to something that somehow led me here. I’m excited to see how it goes for you.
Mmmm! Marrow on toast! That’s my reward for straining stock.
What about using a pressure cooker to make the stock? Sure was traditonal in my family. Not sure where grandms got it from but she sure used it a lot and so do i. i can make died beans that ususlly take 4+ hours by bringing it to pressure and turning it off to sit till it cools 2 times. its amazing. i can’t imagine leaving my stove on for “up uo 72 hours”. seems like such a waste of resources.
my soups taste like they cooked all day and sat for 2 just after they are made.
Kim- actually, please don’t feed cooked bones to your dogs ever. Cooked bones are not digestable and can splinter to cause lacerations in the intestines or crumble and cause impactions. Raw bones are great for dogs (though I caution against beef or turkey femur bones because they are so strong – my 4 year old dog has irrepairable tooth damage from beef femur bones), but cooked bones are not. Not even those yummy smelling smoked ones they sell at the dog food store. It’s just not worth the thousands of dollars in vet bills or pain and suffering of everyone involved.
Brenda – Sally Fallon has spoken against pressure cookers but those of us who have been wallowing around this subject for a while have come to the conclusion that for broth, it’s not the end of the world. SN of Everything Free Eating (google that, it’s a blogspot blog) does her chicken broth in a pressure cooker and has a pretty amazing tale of recovery for her family. I personally do a multi-day simmer method where I bring the broth to a boil, skim, simmer for as long as I’m around or awake, put a lid on it and turn of the heat, then do the same thing the next day or even two days running for beef broth. Works great, and fits into a busy work schedule.
I make and use a lot of broth it is always in my freezer in both pint and quart jars. I also use the multi day cooking method, I am just not comfortable with leaving the stove on when I’m sleepiing. If I’ve failed to brown the bones enough, I will add a cup or two of red wime to the broth and reduce it, all the alcohol cooks off, if that is a concern and it can “save” a light broth. I always feed the bones to the dog,(beef pork, and chicken) but would not feed bones from store bought meats. After discussing this with our vet, it seems as though bones have only become a proble for dogs (the vet told me stories about chiceling pork bones out of dog intestines) and also told me that as a young man his family always fed all bones to the dogs without a problem. When I look at bones (especially chicken and pork bones) from the store, the bones are not as hard, I’ve even been able to stick a fork through chicken and pork bones. That can not be done with the animals we raise on the farm Maybe this is actually a farm management issue?? After all dogs have lived with humans for centuries, and only been fed commercial dog food for 50 years or so.
So happy to receive a link to this blog today. I’ve been making stock for a few years now with the bones from our local free-range, grass fed beef, I am delighted and priviledged to say, using the NT method. What a difference in taste and quality! It is so good to hear others turn off their stove at night and restart the process in the morning. I’ve left it on overnight but didn’t sleep well at all.
I would third the notion of no cooked bones, my dog cracked a back tooth last summer that had to be removed, not good! My neighbor was giving her bones too so I can’t say were the bone came from to agree or disagree with store bought vs local grass fed beef bones.
I will most definitely second the marrow on toast comment. The savory reward of beef stock is the marrow on fresh baked sprouted grain whole wheat toast with a glass of medium bodied red wine! YUM!
Jennifer… thanks so much for your comments and for following the blog! I agree with the stove comment… I do the same thing, turn it off at night so I will sleep better. I love the grass fed beef too. At first it did taste different to me, but now I’m used to it and the regular stuff just tastes weird, really heavy and the fat tastes very different.
Your post inspired me to go home and make chicken stock. So on my way home from work I went to the local Co-op and bought a organic, free range, antiboitic free chicken. It cost $19!!! I am now inspired now to raise my own chickens! LOL! Seriously! I put the stock on to cook while I made salmon caesar salad and a wonderful homemade caesar dressing using yogurt and whey for dinner. The stock continued to cook while we watched a movie. By then I was too tired to pick the meat and strain etc, so it is patiently waiting in the fridge for me to get home. On another subject… where in the world do you find lard, other than the hydrognated kind in the grocery store? They didn’t carry it at all. But I did talk to the butcher to see if I could buy some fat to make my own. We will see if he calls me back today. I guess I must get to know the local butchers. Baby steps, baby steps…
Vera… great job I’m so happy it inspired you!! Baby steps is right! I went into Whole Foods during the holidays and asked for lard, they looked at me like I had two heads or something. In stores I can only find the hydrogenated kind too. But I found a local pork grower that will be providing me with lard soon. Also, I am looking for a local chicken grower, I think we’ll all have better luck going this route (not to mention the chicken may be less expensive). I can get it from my co-op too but they are quite expensive.
But if I cannot find a less expensive source for chickens, I think i’m just going to ‘suck it up’ and pay the price. As Nina Planck said in the Nourished Kitchen article on CNN health the other day: “I don’t need any new sweaters, I want to feed my kids well!” Or feed myself well.
I think it’s a mind shift, to pay for food what it really costs, and realize the worth of it, since we are putting it IN OUR BODIES and it FEEDS us. I’m having trouble getting my mind to accept this but I’m part of the way there, for sure…
What are your thoughts on using a crockpot/slow cooker to make broth?
I’ve been using my crockpot to make chicken broth for a good year or more now. I don’t feel so weird about leaving it on all night. I will let it go for at least 24 hours. Often, I will strain the broth out and then add more water and cook again, until the broth looks too weak. It’s also an easy transition when I’ve cooked the bird in the crockpot to begin with.
I came to this post tonight because I’m cooking my first beef broth from “soup bones” (as labeled by the butcher). After 24 hours in the crockpot (some of which was on high), the bones weren’t soft, as you describe, but the broth was rich and wonderful – I made stew with it tonight. I loaned my NT cookbook out and came here to check to see if I was doing the beef version right, since the bones weren’t soft. Just for kicks, I put in new onions, celery and garlic (since I dumped those in my stew) with fresh water and vinegar and the bones just now to see if I can extract more.
Any thoughts?
OOPS – sorry about the double post. My browser said it had ‘canceled opening the page’, so I hit submit again. Feel free to delete one and this one too.
In my experience, some beef bones don’t ever get ‘soft’. This is why a mix of the type of bones is good to use. The bones that just disappear into the broth (thereby imparting a lot of minerals and gelatin) are the longer, narrower femur(?) bones. The marrow bones stay pretty hard.
I think making broth in the crockpot is great! I love your technique, I’m going to have to try that too. I think anything that makes it easier on us, we should do.
Hello,
I tried to make the beef bone broth and followed the directions. I left it simmering overnight adn awoke to a pot full of bones and no water! it had all completely evaporated. So, should I throw the bones away and try again? I used a medium -low heat and left the cover slightly tilted so air could escape. Can i re-fill with water and keep cooking these same bones? They only cooked for 12 hours. Help!