Beef stock

My wife was cleaning out the freezer, rearranging and stuff  like that when she found my forgotten stash. Sometime last summer I was going to make some kind of Asian something that required a beef stock made with soup bones. Well I bought 6 lbs. and froze them and then forgot them. Her words were do something with them or out they go. So I have a basic recipe for beef stock but wondered if anyone had a special extra good one they might share. Right now I have turnips, leeks, carrots and onions with some beef and the bones. I am going to make it tomorrow.

Adding some salt & pepper to the mix helps bring out the flavours . I've also added ten or so of our home grown bay leaves fresh or dried to give stock a better flavour .
 I would not recommend using sage leaves as these seem to impart a lingering bitterness at the back of your tongue when used in stock making, it spoilt one of our batches of stock . We found out later that it is apparently something to do with the long boiling times

Roasting the bones with a few carrots and half onions to get a tinge of browning in the onions  first  for 25 mi in an already hot( same temp as for roasting beef )  oven also helps develop the flavours and helps releases the bone marrow. If the bones are whole use a hacksaw and cut them in half to allow the marrow to escape in to the stock.
Don't forget to rinse the baking tray out into the stock pot as well for that will hold a lot of flavour and some colour.

We either slow cook them for 12 or more hours in the slow cooking pot  or pressure cook thrm in the pressure canner for 25 min .

 I tried the classic way of standing over the stock pot on the gas ring and removing the scum as it developed whilst not letting the stock actually develop to a fast boil , use a long slow simmer instead once the initial boiling up has taken place.

My  verdict :- A long job and not much difference in taste or colour when  slow cooking them but a difference to colour when pressure cooking them plus a better taste to me .

 One thing I've done was to let the liquid cool , strain off the big lumps through a fine sieve   and then using a clean wet microfibre cloth laid in the strainer gently pour the cooled stock through  the damp cloth.  This has the effect of taking out most of the fat in the stock .

Following this event I've used a fat separating jug/kettle to remove the remaining fat when the stock is quite cold .
It takes a long time to clean 10 pints of cold stock when doing it this way, so I've incorporated it whilst doing other kitchen tasks /duties .

Every time I'd filled the jug , I removed the " filter cloth and washed it out in hand hot water till it came clean , then rinsed it off in cold water to set any mobile particles of fat in the fibres.
 
This has led to a fantastically clear stock which I've put into heat seal bags held vertically & still open in some specially modified 4 inch tubes , frozen it over night and then vac packed & heat sealed the stock , marked up with a marker pen and then stored in the freezer . These frozen packs are usually only used when making soups , as we often use frozen veg as well .
 
I've also high pressure canned about half of each batch of cleaned stock in my Weck canning jars so we can have instant access to small portions of stock when making things like curry's & ground beef dishes , the unused portion of any jar being kept in the fridge ( 3 oC )  for up to four more days .  So long as the stock is boiled for six minutes to kill any developing bacteria it should be OK .

 Our last batch of stock that i made had raw beef bones  plus cooked turkey & chicken bones in it & a cup of dark chopped up cabbage leaves in it.
As well as every veg you have , all of the  the leek greenery was chopped up & used as well as six fine chopped sticks of celery . .. it came out very very good .( 16 pints of stock )

Bake the bones first.

camprn wrote:Bake the bones first.

I said roast the bones some of the carrots carrots and some half onions .. does it make a difference ??

plantoid wrote:

camprn wrote:Bake the bones first.

I said roast the bones some of the carrots carrots and some half onions .. does it make a difference ??

no, but I was just keeping it simple...

OK- Thanks for the tips, I will bake the bones with carrots and onions for 25 min. before adding to the pot. Will also do as Plantoid suggested and put in some other veg. such as celery.

Can I reserve a place at your table for when you use the stock  ........ please ?

camprn wrote:Bake the bones first.

OK. Is that for every type of stock? Like poultry, pork, fish...

You make pork stock?

I've read a top chef saying you don't need to roast chicken bones, but it's necessary for beef bones.

I hadn't heard about sawing them open to get the marrow in the stock. But I'm no expert on beef stock by far. I've hardly ever made it, partly because I rarely eat beef and so don't get any bones.

Marc Iverson wrote:You make pork stock?

Yes, I do it every year with the office Xmas party's ham.  They never finish half the meat and then it's got those 2 huge bones in it.  Just made it in the pressure cooker/canner the other day and froze most of it after using some for a veggie soup.
It doesn't gel like the chicken does, but it gets thick and the fat solidifies and can be removed.

Hmm ... what kind of soup do you make from that? I could see it being a good base in lentil soup, which really benefits from a little ham or sausage.

I made veggie/bean soup.  I started with a can of fava beans, then dumped in a lb bag of frozen Fiesta Ranchero (or something like that) veggies, and then added a few chopped shrooms reconstituted from dried.  The frzn veggies had broccoli, carrots, onions, peppers & I can't remember what else, and about 5 different beans in it.

Pork ham stock soups ( you can use all manner of socks but these we do like with pork bone stock ) . We've found that some soups are better when using the salty cooking water from ham joint .

 At other times we have had a mix of all manner of bones fresh or cooked .
Occasionally we have used a pure stock from  veg ( the holy trinity of carrot ,celery and onion "  with  pork bones that have been roasted & basted along with some of the veg to give a bit of brown colour & browned onion taste .

 In reality what pleases our palates my not please yours , so it's a case of lots of carefully written down accurately measured ingredients for your experimental recipes till you develop those you're really pleased with .

These are some we have tried with a straight veg &  pork bone stock , as well as the salty water from a boiled ham joint .

Pea & ham soup , Ham & piccalilli , Stewing veg soup , Savoy cabbage & turnip, Cream of turnip with smoked ham , Pea & bacon, Jerusalem artichoke & porcini mushroom , carrot & ginger , smoked chicken chowder ( yes I know , it should have been chicken stock ) , split pea & leek .

Others I have recipes for but have not yet tried :-

Minestrone , spring greens , spinach & coconut ,ham & pearl barley , savoy cabbage & bacon, nettle soup, simple pea soup , Wensleydale cheese & bacon, Thai green curry soup ( pork or chicken stock ), Broad bean & Prosciutto ham , Runner bean & braised ham broth , simple red lentil soup, ( we also use a version of this with some of our Indian dishes ), Lentil & bacon,  Brussels sprout & gammon ,

Spinach and coconut soup? That sounds so very odd. Is there much coconut flavor in there, or is it mostly for texture? That's so odd sounding I'd like to hear more or get a recipe, if you wouldn't mind.

well we made it as per the recipe and about half way through we tasted it and my wife said all she could taste were onions. I also thought it did taste oniony but I like onions a lot more than my wife. Well she added a bunch of herbs, rosemary, oregano etc. and a half box of mushrooms. We stuck it outside last night and I brought it in this morning and removed the fat. I can't taste the onions any more, all I taste are mushrooms. Will continue.

Spinach & coconut soup:- It takes about 25 to 30 min to prepare cook and serve it

2 table spoons of olive oil

2 small to medium onions very finely chopped up

3 garlic cloves peeled & crushed ( NOT BULBS )

2 sprigs of fresh thyme

2 teaspoon of fine chopped fresh chive

500 gram  ( A tad over one British 16 ounce pound )  washed fresh spinach

1.2 litres of stock of either pure chicken stock  ,vegetable stock or  pork bones & scraps with the fat carefully & totally  removed from the stock (not salty ham stock /cooking water ).

300 to 400 ml of coconut milk , fresh if possible & strained through a paper kitchen towel to remove any bits .

 One  fresh green de-seeded green chilli pepper very finely sliced ( leave  it out if you don't like the chilli )

 Heat the oil in a big enough pan for the soup , add onion & garlic and then  "  stir / oil " them up .
Reduce heat to very low , cover with a close fitting lid , cook gently for 5m with out browning them ( a glass lidded pan is great for doing these sweating sessions so you can see what happening.)

 When the 5 minutes are up , add the chives , spinach ,thyme , coconut milk, chilli & the stock of choice.  Bring to boil , cover & simmer for 15 min , then  remove it from the  heat & blend it till it's fully smooth.

 Season with salt & pepper to your own tastes  , now  gently reheat & serve with some light crusty bread on the side plate for dunking in the soup ( thin slices of french stick bread ?)

Sometimes with our soups we also butter the bread . ( It's much healthier than the artificial trans fat laden spreads & tasted like real food not axle grease ) .

It should serve six decent portions

I make pork stock as well.  We go thru a lot of ham with feeding our students & I hate to waste the bones!

I also make shrimp stock.