Bone Broth: Restores Bones, Tendons, Joints and Totally Eliminates the Pain

Bone broth has a long history of medicinal use. It’s known to be warm, soothing, and nourishing for body, mind, and soul.

Physicians harkening as far back as Hippocrates have associated bone broth with gut healing. And while the importance of gut health is just now starting to fill our medical journals, this knowledge is far from new.

In fact, you could say modern medicine is just now rediscovering how the gut influences health and disease.

Many of our modern diseases appear to be rooted in an unbalanced mix of microorganisms in your digestive system, courtesy of a diet that is too high in sugars and too low in healthful fats and beneficial bacteria.

Digestive problems and joint problems, in particular, can be successfully addressed using bone broth. But as noted by Dr. Kaayla Daniel, vice president of the Weston A. Price Foundation and coauthor (with Sally Fallon Morell) of the book, Nourishing Broth, bone broth is a foundational component of a healing diet regardless of what ails you.

If you want truly high-quality bone broth or soup, your best bet is to make it yourself. Fortunately, it’s easy. The trickiest part is usually going to be finding organic bones.

Bone broth, Dr. Daniel says, is actually a fast food. It just requires a little planning. One efficient way to create your broth is to use a slow-cooker or crockpot.

This will allow you to put a few basic ingredients into the pot in the morning, turn it on low heat, and by the time you get home in the evening it’s done.

Besides being convenient and efficient, it’s also safe, as you won’t have to worry about leaving a pot puttering on the stove, which could pose a fire hazard if left unattended. “It’s an old-fashioned remedy for the modern world,” Dr. Daniel says.

Benefits of Bone Broth

Leaky gut is the root of many health problems, especially allergies, autoimmune disorders, and many neurological disorders. The collagen found in bone broth acts like a soothing balm to heal and seal your gut lining, and broth is a foundational component of the Gut and Psychology Syndrome (GAPS) diet, developed by Russian neurologist Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride.

The GAPS diet is often used to treat children with autism and other disorders rooted in gut dysfunction, but just about anyone with suboptimal gut health can benefit from it.

Bone broth is also a staple remedy for acute illnesses such as cold and flu. While there aren’t many studies done on soup, one study did find that chicken soup opened up the airways better than hot water.

Processed, canned soups will not work as well as the homemade version made from slow-cooked bone broth. If combating a cold, make the soup hot and spicy with plenty of pepper.

The spices will trigger a sudden release of watery fluids in your mouth, throat, and lungs, which will help thin down the respiratory mucus so it’s easier to expel. Bone broth contains a variety of valuable nutrients in a form your body can easily absorb and use. This includes but is not limited to:

Calcium, phosphorus, and other minerals	Components of collagen and cartilage
Silicon and other trace minerals	Components of bone and bone marrow
Glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate	The “conditionally essential” amino acids proline, glycine, and glutamine

These nutrients account for many of the healing benefits of bone broth, which include the following:

Reduces joint pain and inflammation, courtesy of chondroitin sulfate, glucosamine, and other compounds extracted from the boiled down cartilage and collagen.
Inhibits infection caused by cold and flu viruses etc.

Indeed, Dr. Daniel reports2 chicken soup — known as “Jewish penicillin”—has been revered for its medicinal qualities at least since Moses Maimonides in the 12th century. Recent studies on cartilage, which is found abundantly in homemade broth, show it supports the immune system in a variety of ways; it’s a potent normalizer, true biological response modifier, activator of macrophages, activator of Natural Killer (NK) cells, rouser of B lymphocytes and releaser of Colony Stimulating Factor.

Fights inflammation: Amino acids such as glycine, proline, and arginine all have anti-inflammatory effects. Arginine, for example, has been found to be particularly beneficial for the treatment of sepsis3 (whole-body inflammation). Glycine also has calming effects, which may help you sleep better.
Promotes strong, healthy bones: Dr. Daniel reports bone broth contains surprisingly low amounts of calcium, magnesium and other trace minerals, but she says “it plays an important role in healthy bone formation because of its abundant collagen. Collagen fibrils provide the latticework for mineral deposition and are the keys to the building of strong and flexible bones.”
Promotes healthy hair and nail growth, thanks to the gelatin in the broth. Dr. Daniel reports that by feeding collagen fibrils, broth can even eliminate cellulite too.

How to Make the Most Nourishing Broth

The more gelatinous the broth, the more nourishing it will tend to be. Indeed, the collagen that leaches out of the bones when slow-cooked is one of the key ingredients that make broth so healing. According to Dr. Daniel, if the broth gets jiggly after being refrigerated, it’s a sign that it’s a well-made broth. To make it as gelatinous as possible, she recommends adding chicken feet, and/or joint bones.

All of these contain high amounts of collagen and cartilage. Shank or leg bones, on the other hand, will provide lots of bone marrow. Marrow also provides valuable health benefits, so ideally, you’ll want to use a mixture of bones. You can make bone broth using whole organic chicken, whole fish or fish bones (including the fish head) or beef bones. Vary your menu as the many types offer different flavors and nutritional benefits.

If you’re using chicken, you can place the entire chicken, raw, into a pot and cover with water. Add a small amount of vinegar to help leach the minerals out of the bones. Alternatively, you can use the carcass bones from a roasted chicken after the meat has been removed. To ensure the broth is really gelatinous, Dr. Daniel suggests adding some chicken feet when you use the carcass of a roasted chicken, as some of the collagen will have been leached out already during the roasting process. You can also add vegetables of your choice into the pot.

The most important aspect of the broth-making process is to make sure you’re getting as high-quality bones as you can. Ideally, you’ll want to use organically raised animal bones. It’s worth noting that chickens raised in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) tend to produce chicken stock that doesn’t gel, so you’ll be missing out on some of the most nourishing ingredients if you use non-organic chicken bones. If you can’t find a local source for organic bones, you may need to order them. A great place to start is your local Weston A. Price chapter leader,4 who will be able to guide you to local sources.

Sample Beef Broth Recipe

Below is a classic beef stock recipe excerpted from Nourishing Broth, as well as lamb and venison variations. For more nourishing broth recipes, I highly recommend Hilary Boynton and Mary Brackett’s new GAPS cookbook, The Heal Your Gut Cookbook: Nutrient-Dense Recipes for Intestinal Health Using the GAPS Diet.

Makes 4-5 quarts

Good beef stock requires several sorts of bones: knuckle bones and feet impart large quantities of gelatin to the broth; marrow bones impart flavor and the particular nutrients of bone marrow; and meaty ribs and shanks add color and flavor. We have found that grass-fed beef bones work best–the cartilage melts more quickly, and the smell and flavor is delicious.

Ingredients

About 4 pounds beef marrow and knuckle bones

1 calf or beef preferably cut into pieces

3 pounds meaty bones such as short ribs and beef shanks

1 small can or jar tomato paste (optional)

4 or more quarts cold filtered water

1/2 cup vinegar

3 onions, ends removed and coarsely chopped (skin may be left on)

3 carrots, peeled and coarsely chopped

3 celery sticks, coarsely chopped

1 bouquet garni made with parsley sprigs, thyme sprigs, and bay leaf, tied together

1 tablespoon black peppercorns, or green or white peppercorns, crushed

Directions

Place the knuckle and marrow bones and optional calves foot in a very large pot, toss with vinegar and cover with cold water. Let stand for 1/2 to 1 hour. Meanwhile, place the meaty bones in a stainless steel roasting pan. For a particularly aromatic stock, brush the bones with tomato paste. Brown at 350 degrees in the oven, about ½ hour. When well browned, add these bones to the pot. Pour the fat out of the roasting pan, add cold filtered water to the pan, set over a high flame and bring to a boil, stirring with a wooden spoon to loosen up coagulated juices. Add this liquid to the pot. Add additional water, if necessary, to cover the bones; but the liquid should come no higher than within one inch of the rim of the pot, as the volume expands slightly during cooking. Bring to a simmer and carefully skim any scum that comes to the top. After you have skimmed, add the vegetables, bouquet garni, and peppercorns.

Simmer stock for at least 12 and as long as 24 hours.

Remove bones with tongs or a slotted spoon. Strain the stock into a large bowl or several 2-quart Pyrex measuring cups. Let cool in the refrigerator and remove the congealed fat that rises to the top. Transfer to smaller containers and to the freezer for long-term storage.

Note: The marrow may be removed from the marrow bones a couple of hours into the cooking, and spread on whole grain sourdough bread. If left in the pan for the entire cooking period, the marrow will melt into the broth, resulting in a broth that is cloudy but highly nutritious.

Variation: Lamb Stock

Use lamb bones, especially lamb neck bones and riblets. Ideally, use all the bones left after butchering the lamb. Be sure to add the feet if you have them. This makes a delicious stock.

Bone Broth—A Medicinal ‘Soul Food’

Slow-simmering bones for a day will create one of the most nutritious and healing foods there is. You can use this broth for soups, stews, or drink it straight. The broth can also be frozen for future use. Making bone broth also allows you to make use of a wide variety of leftovers, making it very economical. Bone broth used to be a dietary staple, as were fermented foods, and the elimination of these foods from our modern diet is largely to blame for our increasingly poor health, and the need for dietary supplements.

“I would like to urge people to make as much broth as possible,” Dr. Daniel says in closing. “Keep that crockpot going; eat a variety of soups, and enjoy them thoroughly.”