Post by YoungFogey on Jan 2, 2006 16:16:54 GMT -5
Hmmmm... not sure if I did something wrong or not.
I spent most of the last three days (not constantly! but I started Sunday, and just finished this afternoon) making what I hoped would be some good, nourishing beef stock/bone broth, a la Nourishing Traditions. Started with a number of good marrow bones, some knuckle bones, and (not being a purist on the "beef" part) lamb riblets and even a couple of pig's feet. But I didn't skim it in time, and the "grue" that should have been skimmed sorta semi-incorporated back into the broth. I tried to sort-of-skim it off anyway, and then decided I'd just clarify the stock after it was cooked.
Let the stock cool, skimmed the fat, and that took a good bit of the questionable "sludgy" bits off with it. Then, again following the directions in NT, I heated it back up again and whisked egg whites into the broth until it boiled, then skimmed that (a sort of dirty-grey spongy mass... eww), and strained the broth through a tea-towel. So far so good.
The problem -- if it is a problem -- is this: the first time I had cooled my broth, before skimming the fat, etc., off of it, it had gelled nicely. It wasn't super-thick, but it was definitely gelled. After having clarified it, it now doesn't gel! Does this mean that in the process of clarifying it, I "clarified out" the natural gelatin, which is one of the reasons I wanted to make my own broth in the first place? If so, I'm going to be heartbroken, after all the time and effort I put into it... And did I inadvertently get rid of any other good stuff, too?
Oh, well -- "live and learn, die and forget all," as the saying in my family goes. If I ruined it in the course of trying to make it better, I'll just know better next time. But if someone with more experience making stock/bone broth could tell me what I did do, I'd be grateful!
Many thanks,
Tom
I spent most of the last three days (not constantly! but I started Sunday, and just finished this afternoon) making what I hoped would be some good, nourishing beef stock/bone broth, a la Nourishing Traditions. Started with a number of good marrow bones, some knuckle bones, and (not being a purist on the "beef" part) lamb riblets and even a couple of pig's feet. But I didn't skim it in time, and the "grue" that should have been skimmed sorta semi-incorporated back into the broth. I tried to sort-of-skim it off anyway, and then decided I'd just clarify the stock after it was cooked.
Let the stock cool, skimmed the fat, and that took a good bit of the questionable "sludgy" bits off with it. Then, again following the directions in NT, I heated it back up again and whisked egg whites into the broth until it boiled, then skimmed that (a sort of dirty-grey spongy mass... eww), and strained the broth through a tea-towel. So far so good.
The problem -- if it is a problem -- is this: the first time I had cooled my broth, before skimming the fat, etc., off of it, it had gelled nicely. It wasn't super-thick, but it was definitely gelled. After having clarified it, it now doesn't gel! Does this mean that in the process of clarifying it, I "clarified out" the natural gelatin, which is one of the reasons I wanted to make my own broth in the first place? If so, I'm going to be heartbroken, after all the time and effort I put into it... And did I inadvertently get rid of any other good stuff, too?
Oh, well -- "live and learn, die and forget all," as the saying in my family goes. If I ruined it in the course of trying to make it better, I'll just know better next time. But if someone with more experience making stock/bone broth could tell me what I did do, I'd be grateful!
Many thanks,
Tom