It is nice and chilly outside, which means it is time for lots of soups in our household. Bone broth is so easy to make at home and way more cost effective than buying at the store. It also enhances any meal by being nutrient dense, full of natural collagen, and is extremely healthy for your gut!
Where do you get bones?
Bone broth can be made out of any type of bones that you have handy. Some popular bone broths are made out of beef, pork, lamb, or chicken bones, but fish bones can be used as well. In order to make bone broth, my family saves all of the bones from our left over meals. For example, when we cook one of our pasture-raised whole chickens, we will cut out all of the meat and put the carcass in a freezer safe bag. We then store it in the freezer until we need to make more bone broth. Another option is to buy them from a local farm or a butcher. Many local meat farmers will gladly sell you bones that you can use to make your broth. I highly recommend finding a source that is grass-fed and raised without any additives. This can greatly effect the quality of your broth!
So, how do you make bone broth?
Bone Both can be as easy or as complicated as you want it to be – and honestly, it is never the same for me. By now, I don’t even use a recipe, I just throw what I have on hand in a pot and go, but you can use below as a guide.
What you need:
CrockPot
Water
Bones
Directions:
- Place bones into the CrockPot
- Put in your favorite seasonings (you can use salt, pepper, bay leaf, carrots, onions, etc.) (this is optional)
- Fill the crock pot with filtered water.
- Put the Crock Pot on low and cook for 12-24 hours.
- After the broth has sat for 12-24 hours, strain out the bones and anything extra that you used for flavor.
- Allow the broth to cool and place into a container for storage.
Notes:
While you can store the broth in the fridge, in order to get the most life out of it, store it in smaller portions and stick it in the freezer. When storing my bone broth, I will measure out 1 – 2 cups of broth and pour it into a freezer safe Ziplock bag so that it is readily available for the next meal that I am cooking. If you don’t have Ziplock bags on hand, you can also use a freezer safe mason jar. When you are ready to use your bone broth, all you have to do is thaw it out and it is ready to go!
Any add-ins are completely optional! All you really need for bone broth is bones and water. Again, bone broth is as simple or as complicated as you want.
If you are wanting to add in veggies, don’t forget to save those veggie scraps when you are cooking. You can always freeze the scraps to use later on in your bone broth.
If you want to add more gelatin to your bone broth, you can add in chicken feet, joints, knuckles, etc.
What do I do with all this bone broth?
You can use bone broth for lots of things! Since it is cold outside, my first go to is a warm pot of soup. Check out our post on Sourdough Chicken and Dumplings for one way you can use up some bone broth.
1. Soup
Many soups use some type of broth as the base. Any time you see chicken, beef, or vegetable broth as the base, you can substitute in bone broth and still get that yummy flavor. Also, anytime you see a recipe that calls for a bouillon cube, that can also be substituted with bone broth!
2. Drinking
Bone broth makes an amazing warm drink for you and your family! If you want to ease into drinking bone broth for the health benefits, I highly recommend starting with a bone broth hot chocolate. This is also a great way to ease kids into drinking it too!
3. Cooking
In a lot of recipes, you can substitute water with bone broth. A few of my favorites is cooking rice with bone broth or making a healthy Alfredo sauce using bone broth.
If you have any creative ways that you like to use bone broth, drop them in the comments below!
