Homemade Beef Bone Broth Recipe (From Scraps!) (2024)

FAQs

Can you make beef broth from trimmings? ›

Homemade beef stock is easy to make with roasted beef bones and trimmings, along with vegetables, water, and herbs.

The Rough Recipe

Put all your scraps in the pot and add water until everything starts to float. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce to simmer. If you're using any meat, skim the surface of any foam. Simmer for at least 30-45 minutes, but ideally a few hours.

However, do not add onions, carrots, celery or herbs to your initial pot of simmering bone broth. Instead, enjoy the pure, rich flavor that comes from just the bones, fat, connective tissue and any small amount of meat that may still be on the bones; it is not something that needs or wants amending.

Traditional recipes recommend using bones rich in marrow and flavor, such as beef marrow bones, oxtails, beef feet or beef neck bones. For this article, we will focus on beef marrow bones. To make a nutritious and delicious beef bone broth, we recommend using beef marrow bones or beef oxtails.

Brisket fat trimmings have multiple uses. You can use them to make beef tallow, hamburger meat, homemade sausages, and Yorkshire pudding. You can also use them as meat moisturizer when smoking brisket.

Bone broth (or stock) is made from bones. Regular broth is made from meat. Both can have vegetables and spices added for flavoring, but the meat imparts a different flavor to it's broth versus the marrow and richness from bones. Both are good, and used for different things.

Bone broth and meat stock are known for their gut-healing and soothing qualities. Bone broth primarily uses a mix of bones and joints to make the broth, while meat stock uses gelatinous meat and meaty bones. A variety of vegetables and herbs, such as celery, carrots, and parsley can be included for depth of flavor.

When you make a beef broth, it is best to use cuts suitable for stews. For a light beef broth, you can use leaner cuts, such as the shank, the shoulder, or the anterior muscle. Instead, for a more flavorful beef broth, add the belly, broth bones or brisket.

Then add apple cider vinegar, which is added primarily because the acidity breaks down the collagen and makes it more abundant in the broth. You can also sub lemon juice, but we prefer apple cider vinegar. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cover.

Just as when you're making stock for soups or stews, boiling will cause soluble proteins and rendered fat to emulsify into the cooking liquid. By simmering, you avoid emulsifying the fat and thus keep the stock clearer, and we found that the scum created simply settled to the bottom of the pot.

Why put carrots in bone broth? ›

Carrots, onions, garlic, celery, peppers, mushrooms, and tomatoes are just some of the vegetables you can add to your bone broth to give it added flavor and nutritional value.

Generally, store-bought stock contains more vitamins and minerals per cup than store-bought broth. It contains more than double the electrolytes, and is a good source of potassium. It is higher in protein, carbohydrates, fat and calories containing 86 calories per cup versus 15 calories found in broth.

Beef has more collagen per gram of protein

Beef bone broth also has slightly more glycine and proline. These are two amino acids that make up collagen, along with hydroxyproline and arginine. Chicken broth still has collagen, however it is around 10% less per serving than beef.

All bone broths have similar nutritional value. The healthiest bone broth is made with organic, grass-fed bones, a mix of marrow and joint bones, and simmered for 24-48 hours. If you choose store-bought options, look for ones with minimal additives and organic, grass-fed sources.

Save money and reduce food waste by saving your pork & steak bones, chicken carcasses & skin, shrimp shells & fish bones, gristle & fat trimmings, veggie & herb scraps to make bone broth. Making bone broth is SIMPLE if you use a Crock-Pot or Instant Pot where watching it is not as crucial as cooking it on the stove.

All you have to do is save up your leftover vegetable scraps (peels, ends, cores) in the freezer – seriously! Once you have enough, dump those scraps into a pot full of water and simmer. Cook for a few hours, and you've got yourself some tasty homemade vegetable broth.

Vegetables that add sweetness include carrots, parsnips, golden beets, fennel, corn cobs, pea pods, and leftovers of previously roasted vegetables. Vegetables that contribute savory bass notes include onions, leek tops, mushroom stems, spinach, chard, squash peels.