Content warning: This post frankly discusses using the flesh and bones of animals as a source of nutrition for humans. There are also pictures of animal bones.
I have encountered various explanations of what makes a liquid “stock” and what makes it “bone broth.” Several of these explanations contradict each other, and I have no investment in helping to sort them out. I am calling whatever it is I make and enjoy bone elixir, as I like Dungeons and Dragons and fantasy novels, and you can call it whatever suits you.
Bone elixir is basically bones simmered in water until the water has become opaque. Many claims are made as to the health-conferring benefits of this extract, but I can’t confirm or deny those. I find it soothing, either as a beverage by itself or a small meal with toast and an egg poached in it, when I want to be treated kindly or my stomach is upset. Diluted in water (or not), it is also useful in cooking.
High-quality bone elixirs (generally labeled bone broth) are commercially available now, but in any quantity they are astonishingly expensive. Even using expensive local free-range new bones at full price, I can make elixir at less than $1 per cup, vs. $3.50 per cup for the fancy brand I like.
You can skip to the end if you just want more or less a recipe.
Sourcing bones
I get bones from two primary sources:
- A meat farmer, butcher, or grocery store meat case (“new bones”).
- The bones left over from eating meat that had at least one bone in it (“used bones”).
Because the elixir-making process extracts just about everything from the bones—good and bad—and for abundant other reasons, it seems worthwhile to prioritize starting the project with responsibly raised animals.
New bones: cheaper than meat
Soup bone is a general term for the bony odds and ends left over after butchering an animal that are not, by themselves, good for eating. Knuckle bones, joints, marrow bones, feet, neck bones—these are ideal for turning directly into bone elixir without having them for dinner first.
Few and fewer mainstream chain grocery stores make soup bones easily available to the public, but they are not impossible to obtain, especially if one lives in the South and doesn’t mind pork. If the person at a meat counter looks approachable, I might ask if they sell any of their soup bones. I have had good luck at smaller markets, especially those that serve specific culinary traditions, as they tend to anticipate having customers who appreciate some clearly labeled and priced bones.
Bones from my local farmers’ market are my preference. The idea at the market is that you can walk around and ask your dumb city questions. I don’t like asking dumb city questions, and the first meat connect I approached when I set out to make bone elixir seemed exasperated at my asking for bones and tried to sell me things I didn’t want. Now I exclusively spend my money with the second one, who was very kind and helpful and asked if I wanted beef, pork, goat, or lamb. I have bought meat off the back of her truck in a parking lot when the farmers’ market was closed.
About two pounds of new bones are sufficient to make a batch of elixir in my eight-quart stock pot.
Used bones: free
For about the first decade-plus of learning to feed myself like an adult at home, I made a fair number of meals involving boneless skinless meat portions. Then I started making bone elixir and realized that not only is bone-in meat typically cheaper, but it tastes better and the bones are useful in their own right.
There was a time when I would save each type of bone in a separate, neatly labeled zippered plastic bag: “BEEF,” “PORK,” “GOAT,” and so on. But I would get impatient and fill out whatever kind of elixir I was ostensibly making with bones from another category anyway, and after going through all the steps couldn’t tell much difference. Now I just keep “HOOFED” separate from “POULTRY,” because those are even to me clearly different flavor profiles. If I made more bony fish or shellfish at home, I would also keep a “SEA” bag.
I use about two full zipper bags for one batch of elixir in the eight-quart stock pot. If I have roasted an entire chicken, the chicken remnants count as one bag.
Preparation
My usual meat connect was running a special on lamb bones (new), so that’s what’s in the pictures that follow, but the general process is the same no matter what bones come to hand or whether they’re new or used. The foundation of this method comes from the Taste of Home test kitchen, paying attention to Bon Appétit’s warnings.
Blanch
Put the bones (about 2–2.5 pounds) in an eight-quart stock pot and covered them with cold water. Brought the pot to a boil, boiled for 15 minutes. Preheated the oven to 450℉. A murky foam developed on top of the boiling water; the point of the blanching is to get whatever this foam is out of the bones and down the garbage disposal.
Roast
Drained the blanched bones, rinsed them, and put them in a much-abused glass casserole that fits in my oven (standard baking sheets do not). Used tongs because the bones were hot. Roasted them in the oven for 30 minutes, then added 2.5 carrots before roasting for another 30 minutes. The carrots were starting to look sad in the vegetable drawer, and I thought an all lamb-bone elixir might need a little something to mellow it. (It didn’t.)
In general, I fall firmly into the No Vegetables camp of elixir-making, on the grounds that you can always add various flavors later, but you can’t remove them. Vegetable stock is its own thing.
The simmer
Used the tongs again to move the roasted bones into the stock pot. Filled the stock pot to within about two or three inches of the top with water. I went to the trouble of measuring this time but did not write down the final tally; it was 5 or 6 quarts of water. Added about two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar (it is supposed to help the bones break down), two bay leaves, a little salt and pepper, and the last bit of rosemary I had in a spice jar, partly to use it up, and partly because I was overthinking the “but it’s lamb, surely I have to be fancy” thing.
If I had a child in the house or a gas stove with an open flame, I might confine the simmering within waking hours. It is perhaps important to note that I have neither. This batch hit its simmer at about 10:30 PM; I checked it periodically over the next hour to make sure the temperature was holding steady (my stovetop is old and fickle) and, as it was, went to bed. Got up around 4 AM to use the bathroom and went downstairs to check the elixir. It needed nothing.
Indeed, after 18 hours on the stove it still needed nothing. But the liquid had finally started to evaporate to an appreciable degree and I needed the stove for other things, so I called it done.
Straining and storage
Set a fine mesh strainer over a large bowl and carefully poured the contents of the stock pot through it. If there is more liquid in the pot than the bowl will hold, I either work in stages or get out a second pot or bowl.
As I know from too much personal experience, sudden temperature changes break glass, so I take a middle path assisted by physics to get the elixir cool enough to go into the freezer in a timely fashion.
Used a measuring cup and a funnel to transfer elixir from the bowl to jars. I have made so much less mess in my kitchen since I broke down and got a set of cheap plastic funnels. Left headroom in the jars, as water expands when it freezes. As soon as the jars were just a little warmer than room temperature, put them in the refrigerator for about an hour, then into the freezer.
The bones and whatnot left in the strainer do not go in the compost pile. If you can’t bring yourself to throw them away, bury them in the back yard deep enough that hungry scavengers won’t sniff them out and come live with you.
Process summary
- Put ~2 lbs. bones in 8 quart stock pot. Cover bones with cold water. Bring pot to boil, then boil without lid for 15 minutes. Drain and rinse bones, discard water.
- [IF USING NEW BONES: Transfer bones to baking sheet or roasting pan. Roast bones for 1 hour at 450℉. If including vegetables, add them after 30 minutes. Discard or repurpose fat rendered during roasting; it does not go in the elixir.]
- Return bones to stock pot. Fill pot with cold water, leaving enough room for liquid to simmer without hitting the pot lid. Add 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar and minimal desired optional spices.
- Bring liquid to boil, put lid on pot, and reduce heat to achieve a consistent low rolling simmer. Simmer for 16–24 hours, checking liquid level periodically. Some reduction in liquid level is normal and desirable. If you get worried, it’s okay to add some water back.
- Strain liquid and decant into storage containers. Leave room for liquid expansion. Lower the temperature before closing the containers and freezing.
Variables and observations
- High-quality meaty soup bones can often be made into an excellent slow-cooked soup or stew (though one with little meat in it) before repurposing the bones for elixir. That is what I should have done with these lamb bones and what I plan to do with the second bag I got free.
- Blanching is a good idea for all bones, new and used, as nothing kills germs or eliminates competing flavors like a fine rolling boil.
- If the bones have been cooked in some manner at least once, roasting is not necessary.
- Poultry bones are typically smaller, lighter, and thinner than hoofed animal bones, so they take less time to break down. If you can snap a poultry bone in half with one hand, the elixir is probably done.
- Excessive evaporation before the 16-hour mark can be a sign that the pot lid doesn’t fit right or the burner is on too high.
- Once chilled or frozen, the fat in the elixir turns into a little white ring or disk at the top of the jar. You can either pick the fat out before consuming the elixir or don’t worry about it, depending on your preferences.
- I can get by with relatively few kitchen gadgets, but in my opinion tongs and funnels are not optional.
