Home Made Bone Broth Recipe

Bone broth has made an extraordinary quick entry to the "healthy food" list which changes almost everyday in the last several years. In our childhood, it was a very valuable thing. I don't know why but for a while it was nothing but pure fat for the "specialists". In recent years it managed to clear its name and took the badge of good food back. Especially because of its collagen content, it has become a favorite of those who are afraid of aging.

What are the Benefits of Bone Broth?

Collagen is a substance that slows down aging. It gives the skin elasticity and makes the skin look younger. It helps prevent cellulite formation and decreases cellulite.

Bone broth is also very useful for bones. It accelerates healing in bone fractures and joint problems. Effective against the problem of osteoclasis in older ages. It allows children to have stronger bones and a healthier skeletal system. It strengthens the immune system and helps to healing of the common cold. It helps the digestive system to work better.

How to Use Bone Broth?

So far, it's all about health. Let's talk about the taste a little. You can drink bone broth directly or you can use it to add flavor to your dishes. It is an amazing flavor especially for rice and soups. You can also add bone broth to any other meal. In particular, it will add a distinct flavor to vegetable dishes cooked with very little water or without water.

How to prepare bone juice?

Although it is not difficult to prepare bone broth, it may seem like "a little" time consuming. But once you start to do it, you see how easy it is.

Here in Madrid they sell lamb just in chops or legs. When I want to buy chopped or ground lamb they also give the bones separately. This is how I started do bone broth. If you want to buy extra bones, you can just ask your butcher. You can buy sheep or cow bones at a very reasonable price.

You can cook bone broth on the stove, in a slow cooker or (to avoid the smell) on electric heaters in the balcony. By the way because it is cooked very slowly, the water evaporation is very little. This keeps water loss at minimum. So there's no chance of water to run out because of boiling. In addition, if you do not open the lid frequently, it won't smell a lot. Even if you don't have the opportunity to do this on the balcony, cooking in the kitchen is less disturbing than you would expect.

How is the Consistency of Bone Broth?

When you first take the bone both from the stove, it is still liquid. When set aside in the refrigerator overnight, it becomes like jelly and a dark colored layer subsides under. This is marrow, for which we cook bones this long. So, don't try to clean up or filter it.

With this marrow layer a layer of fat is also formed on top. If you put the broth into a deep but narrow dish, the layer would be thicker. You can either throw away of use this fat instead of butter in your meals. Instead I prefer to pour the broth into a large dish. This way the fat layer becomes very very thin and I use it together with broth.

I froze the broth for 3 hours first. By this way it doesn't harden too much and is possible to be cut.

How is Bone Juice Stored?

There are many ways to keep bone broth. This is the best way for me. You can improve your own methods.

You can keep it in the refrigerator for a long time as long as there is a thick layer of fat on it, but you should consume it in maximum one week after breaking the fat.

There are people who freeze them by putting them in plastic cups that do not contain BPA and then remove and put them in plastic bags, but this method has a handicap. Each freezer may not be suitable for plastic cups.

Another method is to put it in small ziplocks that doesn't contain bpa and then freeze in a horizontal way after it has cooled down completely. You can also use BPA-free refrigerator ice cube bags.

With these measurements, I get up to 15 portion bone broths. You can increase the amount of ingredients and increase the portion.

Enjoy the recipe ...

Bon appetit...