Bone broth recipe

In honour of recent discussion about calcium and vitamin D supplementation, I’m sharing my easy, simple recipe for bone broth. This is a great way to get calcium and other minerals from the bones, as well as other nutrients from the meat and cartilage. Plus it feels great to truly use every beneficial part of your food before throwing it away.

I like to buy a roasted chicken (the ones from Whole Foods are amazing!), cut off the meat (which I store in the freezer and pull out for a quick meal), and use the leftover bones. Basically you can just get some bones, throw whatever else you like in there too, and boil it all. There is really no way to mess this up, except if you boil it too long, in which case it turns kind of gelatinous… Don’t worry, I’ll tell you how long from my own experience!

You can use the broth to cook rice or other grains, as a base for soups, or in any variety of ways to add taste and nutrition to other dishes.

Bone Broth

(makes about 2-3 litres of broth)

Ingredients:

• Bones! You can use chicken or beef, whichever you prefer.
• 1 Tbsp vinegar (I like apple cider because it is less vinegary tasting)
• Spices of your choice to taste (salt and pepper are great)
• Veggies of your choice (I use chopped garlic and onions, sometimes some carrots and celery too)

Immune boosting option! Add ingredients for Change of Season Soup (I’ve bought packages of this from Herbie’s Herbs) along with your veggies! Change of Season soup is an Asian medicine recipe using four herbs (Astragalus, Codonopsis, Dioscorea, and Lycii) which helps your body adjust to the transition between seasons to prevent getting sick.

Directions:

1. Place bones and vinegar in a large stockpot and cover with filtered water.
2. Cover and bring to a boil.
3. Turn down the heat to between low and medium and let simmer for about 1.5 to 2 hours.
4. Add spices and veggies.
5. Turn heat up again to boil more vigourously, then turn it down to simmer again for another hour.
6. Remove from heat and strain into a large bowl.
7. Discard bones and other solids.
8. Place bowl in refrigerator overnight and in the morning skim off the top layer of fat.
9. Decant the liquid into airtight, leakproof, and ideally glass containers and store in the fridge or freezer.

Notes:

• Simmering for more than 3-4 hours can result in a gelatinous broth!
• Use refrigerated broth within 7 days
• Use frozen broth within 6 months

For more recipes, check out my Recipes page!