Crock Pot Bone Broth

I have never made a bone broth.  Don't get me wrong, I have made plenty of Chinese soups that use beef and pork bone but never a broth just from the bone purely to store and drink...like hot chocolate. LOL

I used this recipe as a basis.  As nomnompaleo.com noted, you can easily substitute pork or chicken bones in place of beef and the results are all good.  She also gave a great tip! I should definitely befriend my local butcher as he may even give me a big bag of bones for pennies! I really hope my butcher charges me pennies for a bag of fatty deliciousness; BONE MARROW! My mother told me that she used to make us soups with bone marrow all the time...I have fond memories of the tubes of marrow! She said back in the day, butchers gave it away or threw it away...she joked that now we have to pay for it like we're buying meat cause of all the foodies and innovative ways to cook!

Ingredients:

• 2 carrots, chopped medium
• 2 celery stalks, chopped medium
• 1 large leek (original recipe called for medium onion but I did not have one to spare)
• 7 garlic cloves, smashed
• ~ 4 lb of beef and marrow bones
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar
• 6 pieces of  Wai San (click to see image.  It is the white one in the photo.  Here is more info on why it's so great to use! My mom wrote on my bag, good for skin)
• 1 oz Goji Berries (click to see image and here's more info)
• water 
• Kosher salt  (I only added salt to the ready to drink individual servings)

Too be quite honest, I should have used more Wai San and Goji Berries for the amount of water I used...but it was my first time making it and I didn't want to over power it. Though what am I saying?! LOL for a 3 quart pot of soup I use the same amount and my slow cooker is 7 quarts!

I cooked it for 8 hours and while I prepped my vegetables, I heated my crock pot for 30 minutes.  So I set it on low for 8.5 hours.

This is what my beef and marrow bones looked like.

I added my veggies to a 7-quart (or at last a 6-quart) slow cooker along with my bones.

Then add enough water to cover the bones (make sure all bones are covered...and since my crock pot was heating up, I had to use another container/bowl to add water to the pot.

Add the bay leaves, apple cider vinegar, wai san, and goji berries.

I also decided to resemble my bones so that all the marrow bones were at the surface as to not melt completely into the broth when cooking.  You'll see why!

Again I set it for 8 hours (with an additional 30 minutes to heat the pot prior to adding the ingredients but the original calls for 8-10 hours of cook time)

When it’s done, pour the broth through a strainer and discard the solids OR do what I did and make more broth!

We did not drink the broth when it was hot...because of this layer of fatty oil floating on top of the soup.  We let it cool and refrigerated it till it solidified.

In the mean time, I got ready to make a second batch with the same bones minus the marrow (look down below and you will see what I did with them).

Again, I returned all the solids back into the pot and added more water, 6 pieces of Wai San, 1 oz of Goji berries and 2 Tbsp of Apple Cider.  Again, no salt...I like the natural flavoring of the beef bones along with the light sweetness of the goji berries.  Salt can always be added to the individual servings to taste.

So what did Day One look like after being refrigerated?  Ta Da!

  

Really easy to remove

 Look at this gelatinous beaut!

This is ready to be microwaved and sipped like hot chocolate. 30 to 60 seconds then add salt to taste.

Day two in the morning looked like...

 All the brown looking strips are the Wai San...and the goji berries sweeten the soup as previously mentioned without overpowering the soup. Also by not adding salt into the broth allowed for each individual to adjust the saltiness.  For me personally. I only really need a light pinch.  I enjoy the different notes in the soup...like how people sip coffee and taste the roast...

After I drained the second batch, it was easy to distinguish what survived two 8 hour hot tub baths. LOL Most of the fat melted into the broth and the tendons were very visible.

Baby Wong and Big Wong went to town on the tendon with a sprinkle of freshly ground sea salt.
 

 Look at how much less fatty oil is floating above the broth!

A couple of hours in the fridge and it's ready to be used or you can freeze for future use (see below for what I do to freeze).

 This is the fat from day one (left) and the fat from day two (right) Much different also because day one had marrow as well.

Also look at how much darker the day two broth is!  Maybe all the goji berries?!

I did not throw away the solids, instead I added them back tot the crock pot and added water to cover, 2 Tbsp of apple cider vinegar, 6 pieces of Wai San and 1 oz of Goji Berries.  I thought why waste perfectly good bones when I can used them for one more batch!  So batch three is in the fridge as I type this. 

 This is what the bones look like after Day three...no meat, no fat, no tendon.  BONE DRY. :)

OK so what did I do with all the broth?!

I weighed out 8 oz bags (cause most recipes usually call for a cup of broth) and threw them all into a larger zip lock bag to prevent any kind of explosion in the freezer as it freezes...only takes a little pressure to open these puppies up and it'll be a headache to clean!

FINALLY....Drum roll please! What did I do with the marrow?

Remember when I said to stack them at the top above the other bones...well this is why!  I strategically set the marrow bones on top and removed them for consumption after the first cooking period.   Since we'll be straining the solids from the liquid...why waste beautiful marrow!

Sprinkle a little sea salt and enjoy!!!

 
Hope you enjoy this as much as the family did...You get bone broth, marrow, and tendon all in one dish!

Enjoy! XOXO