Your Bone Broth Questions: From Reusing Bones to Powder Picks - Ask a Nutritionist

Transcript:

Britni: Hi everyone, and welcome to this midweek segment of Dishing Up Nutrition called “Ask a Nutritionist”. My name is Britni Vincent. I'm a Registered and Licensed Dietitian here at Nutritional & Weight and Wellness. On today's show, I will be answering a few great questions that we have received about bone broth, which is a timeless nutrient dense food with some pretty impressive medicinal benefits and it's really timely.

And as here in Minnesota, the weather's starting to get a little bit cooler. You're maybe beginning to make more soups and stews, and you might think about including bone broth in these once you hear about all of the great benefits.

Healing benefits of bone broth

So first, before answering the questions that we have received, I want to dive into some of the healing benefits of bone broth. And you've probably heard more about bone broth in recent years as it's become popular again, and bone broth isn't just soup stock. It's very different.

So I want to talk about this nutrient powerhouse in more depth. So it's recognized for its ability to support our gut health, immune function, joint health, even skin health. And a big part of its benefits is because it's rich in collagen. Now, collagen also has become quite a buzzword in the wellness world, and you've probably seen it in powders, drinks, maybe even in your morning coffee drink.

The details are collagen helps to strengthen the skin, support elasticity, and even improve the hydration of your skin. So yes, bone broth and collagen can be considered a beauty food, but it really goes a lot deeper than that. Bone broth is also very excellent for joint health. So think about this, your joints are literally made of the same nutrients found in bone broth: hyaluronic acid, glucosamine, chondroitin, calcium, magnesium.

So it makes sense, right? What better way to nourish your joints than to give them the building blocks of what they're made up? And let's not forget about the amino acids that are found in bone broth. So especially glycine and proline. These amino acids play a key role in your joint mobility and tissue repair all over your body.

But they're not just great for joints. Also wonderful for your gut health. We talk a lot about the importance of gut health at Nutritional Weight & Wellness because the reality is when your gut is off, everything else can follow.

You can think of your gut as really the foundation of your health. Bone broth contains collagen like I mentioned, but also L-glutamine, both of which are going to help the cells of the intestinal lining. So it's going to calm down inflammation in your gut, repair a compromised gut barrier, or what we call leaky gut and just improve overall digestion.

And here's something else you might not know about bone broth. It might even help your sleep. So I mentioned it contains glycine, which is an amino acid, and glycine supports the central nervous system. Research shows that glycine can help promote a sense of calm, improve sleep quality, and even potentially help with cognitive performance during the day.

So you might start thinking about sipping on a warm mug of bone broth as part of your morning routine. Or sometimes people do that as part of their afternoon snack. Or like I mentioned earlier, using it as a base in soups and stews because you're going to be giving your body a deeply nourishing restorative tool by using more bone broth.

Can you reuse a soup bone?

Now that I've talked about some of the benefits of bone broth, let's dive into the listener questions. The first question is, can you reuse a soup bone or does it lose its vitamin value? Excellent question. And the answer is yes. You can reuse soup bones to make bone broth, but it does depend on how they were used the first time.

So here's some qualifications when it's okay to reuse bones. If the bones still have a visible marrow or collagen to them, they likely still have more nutrients to provide. If the bones were previously used in a short cook, like a quick stock or light soup, they're still again going to be nutrient dense.

Roasted bone can actually even provide more depth of flavor to your broth. And one simple test is after simmering your bone broth, check the broth if it has a gelatinous consistency when it's chilled. And if it does, it's a great sign that your bones have valuable collagen and gelatin, and that bone broth is going to be super nutrient rich.

So here are some reasons why you would not want to reuse bones. If they've been simmered for 12 to 24 hours previously, most of the nutrients at that point and collagen have already been extracted. If the bros are visibly crumbly, soft, or dry, again, they're not going to have much to offer.

So time to just compost the bone or discard it. Here's a little pro tip. When you are making bone broth, add a splash of apple cider vinegar while simmering, and that's going to help to pull out even more minerals from the bones.

Is powdered bone broth safe or recommended?

Question two, is powdered bone broth safe? If so, what should I look for in a quality brand? So powdered bone broth can absolutely be a part of your nutrition plan, but there are definitely some pros and cons to it. So the pros are, it's convenient, right? It's a powder versus dealing with a liquid. No trip to the butcher, no long simmering times; could be great for traveling or quick sips between meals, and then often has a longer shelf life too.

So some of the cons are processing of these bone broth powders may involve high heat, which may denature some of the proteins and destroy some of the delicate nutrients found in bone broth. The reality is many powders include preservatives, emulsifiers, artificial sweeteners like sucralose and aspartame, all of which are just not great for our health in general.

Another key piece to mention is it's not necessarily a substitute for a protein powder because a bone broth powder may not be a complete protein, unlike something like a grass-fed whey protein. If you do want to search for a bone broth powder, here's what to look for:

Choose a product that is certified GMP, and you may see something on the label somewhere that says CGMP, and that means it's undergone third party testing for purity and quality. And then read the labels very carefully. Look at that ingredient list. Look for something with minimal ingredients. Avoid those artificial sweeteners I mentioned, added sugar, or other ingredients that you might not even be able to identify. And grass-fed, pasture raised organic sources would be ideal.

Can you reuse bones from an organic rotisserie chicken to make bone broth?

The third question is, “We often buy organic rotisserie chicken from Whole Foods. Can we reuse those bones to make bone broth?” And the answer is absolutely. This is a fantastic and sustainable way to get more nutrition out of the food.

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So here's how you could turn those leftovers into a healing broth. You gather the bones and you can use a single, rotisserie chicken, the leftovers, or if you just have smaller bones that you've accumulated, you can stick those into the freezer until you've got enough to make a bone broth.

So you gather the bones, add it to a pot. You could use a stock pot, slow cooker, pressure cooker. You can add aromatics, toss in onion peels, carrot and celery, garlic, herbs. You can store veggie scraps that you would typically throw away. Again, just throw them in your freezer to be able to use when you're making bone broth.

Cover it with water, fully submerge everything. Simmer it. So when you're using a stove top, think about simmering it for four to 24 hours. The longer you simmer, the richer that bone broth is going to be in nutrients and in taste. If you use the slow cooker, think about 12 to 24 hours on low. And a pressure cooker is going to take about 90 to 120 minutes on high pressure.

Then you're going to strain the broth to remove any of the solids and then you cool and store, you could refrigerate up to five days or works great to freeze. You could put it in ice cube trays if you're going to use it for smaller portions, like again, just kind of sipping on a mug of bone broth.

That could be an easy way to do it. And we actually have a step by step video on how to make bone broth. And also a written out recipe that you can find on our website at weightandwellness.com. So once you get on our website, you can search for bone broth and these will just pop up.

So, like I mentioned, you can sip on this on its own. It can feel really nourishing, especially on a cold day. And you're going to get a little bit of protein from this, plus all of the nutrients that I mentioned, or use it as a base for soups, stews, if you're cooking a grain, you could even add it to a smoothie for a little bit of hidden nutrient boost, especially if you're freezing them in an ice cube tray. That could be a great way to use those bone broth ice cubes.

How does bone broth compare to eating animal protein and/or using a collagen supplement?

I also want to, talk about a question that I get asked sometimes. How does bone broth compare to eating animal protein and or just using a collagen supplement? And so there are some similar benefits in that eating enough protein is definitely key for our health, as we often discuss at Nutritional Weight & Wellness, and on our Dishing Up Nutrition podcast.

And then taking a high quality collagen supplement like our Key Collagen is also very beneficial: skin health, joint health, overall tissue repair, gut health, and when you are using just a collagen powder, you're going to miss out on some of those benefits, like the glucosamine and the chondroitin that I mentioned are found in the bone broth, which is great for our joints and basically, bone broth is kind of in a league of its own.

It takes it to the next level because it contains the nutrients that come directly from bones, cartilage, connective tissue of the animal, parts of the animal that we just typically don't consume. When you're simmering it for hours, you're pulling out all of those wonderful nutrients: the collagen, gelatin, hyaluronic acid, glucosamine, chondroitin.

These are building blocks for joints, skin, our gut lining. So these are not necessarily all nutrients that you're going to get just by eating animal protein and taking a collagen supplement. So there is definitely a place for consuming bone broth, taking a collagen supplement, and then of course, also eating your animal protein to ensure you're getting enough protein every day. So you can think of bone broth as just like a little extra nourishment that you wouldn't get otherwise.

So I want to thank you so much for listening to this episode of Dishing Up Nutrition’s “Ask a Nutritionist”. If you found this helpful, please take a moment, leave us a rating, a review on your favorite podcast app. This helps us reach even more listeners who want to feel empowered in their food choices. If you have a nutrition question you'd like answered on a future episode, join our private Dishing Up Nutrition Facebook group. Just search Dishing Up Nutrition on Facebook.

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