Probiotic Bone Broths | 3 Recipes With Chicken, Beef, Fish

Probiotic bone broths are delicious! A good bone broth feels soothing on the gut and is easy to digest. Bone broths get even better when adding fermented vegetables. This post will give you the basics.

Basic broth ingredients

You can use beef, chicken, fish, or wild game for making broths. However, some broths are very rich while other are lighter.

What about wild game broths?

They are excellent! My sister lives in the north and makes bone broths on moose bones. This broth has a pleasant, strong taste, and is surprisingly light.

The bones, marrow, feet, skin, and joints provide most of the collagen. Use organic bones or bones from local farmers. Freshness is key! Bones and trimmings from wild game like moose, wild boar, or caribou are excellent. It seems that mixing vegetables and bones together makes for a better broth than just using vegetables without bones or vice versa.

Turn it into a probiotic bone broth

Adding fermented vegetables to a broth add more taste and natural bacteria; you can call it a probiotic bone broth. Adding sauerkraut is a classic, but you can also add fermented garlic, Kimchi, fermented tomatoes, or some other fermented food. Add the fermented ingredients just before serving to preserve the live bacteria. Probiotic bone broths get a tangier, more refreshing flavour.

Ingredients

• Bones, skin, feet, tendons, sinews, joints
• A whole chicken, pigeon, or pheasant
• Giblets from chicken, goose or duck
• Fish heads, carcasses, whole fish
• Sauerkraut or fermented garlic

Tools: Select a tall and narrow pot that is large enough for all the ingredients. There should be some room at the top left so you can easily skim away impurities. Have a tasting spoon ready to determine the taste as it boils. Add just a little salt at the start, the rest at the end.

Tips: Add herbs and vegetables during the last hour of cooking chicken or beef broths. This way, more nutrients in the veggies are preserved. After cooking, you can use a hand blender to make a smooth broth with the vegetable left in the broth.

Probiotic chicken broth recipe

Chicken bone broths are best when made on organic or farmed raised chicken. Below is a basic and gentle recipe. Some like to roast the chicken bones before boiling the broth as it adds more taste. Another way to add more flavour is to lightly brown the major ingredients like bones and vegetables in the pan before adding water.

Chicken feet are excellent for broths, if you can get over an initial disgust.

1. Put 2-3 pounds of chicken bone, feet, skin, carcass into a pan, cover with about 3-4 quarts of cold water
2. 1 tablespoon vinegar
3. Bring to a boil, remove the foam
4. 1-2 teaspoons roughly crushed black peppers
5. 1 tablespoon minced ginger root
6. 1 teaspoon turmeric powder
7. 1 minced garlic clove
8. 1 chopped onion
9. A little salt
10. 1 bay leaf
11. Cover with lid, gently simmer for 6-24 hours

About an hour before the broth is ready, add the following:

• A little thyme
• Fresh parsley
• 1-2 finely chopped carrots
• 1-2 finely chopped celery stalks

Just before serving, add fermented ingredients like sauerkraut or fermented or black garlic.

Probiotic fish broth recipe

If you’re new to bone broths, then fish broths are a good start as they are cheap and fast to prepare. You can also include other kinds of seafood like shellfish which is delicious.

How long to boil: There is some controversy about how long you should boil a fish broth. Usually one hour is enough though for a good broth.

What fish to use: I suggest avoiding oily fish like salmon, tuna, herring, and similar. I’ve tried preparing broths from oily fish a few times, but I personally think it tastes a bit too overwhelming. The whole house also had a fishy smell for hours. I think the broth turns out much better when using cod, rockfish, sole, snapper, halibut, turbot, or similar. Some also love shellfish, you just have to strain the broth more carefully.

Ingredients. Try getting the ingredients at a fish market or from a fish monger. Often heads and carcasses are cheap. Remove the gills from the heads before cooking. The recipe below is basic so fiddle with the ingredients as you like. If you want more flavour, simmer the veggies and fish heads in butter for 5 minutes before adding water.

• 2-4 pounds of fish heads without gills, and carcasses
• 1-2 tablespoons butter or ghee
• 1-2 cloves
• 1-2 bay leaves
• 1 tablespoons vinegar
• 1 teaspoon roughly crushed black peppercorn
• Finely diced carrots, onions, and celery
• Option: 1 cup dry white wine; lemongrass
• Just before serving, add fermented vegetables like sauerkraut, fermented garlic, or kimchi.

Instruction

1. Add fish and white wine in a large pan, add water to  cover ingredients
2. Bring to a boil, skim off the white foam
3. Reduce heat, add rest of ingredients, gently simmer for 1 hour
4. Remove from heat, cool for 20-30 minutes
5. Sieve the stock to remove small bones

Fish stock keeps in the fridge for 4-5 days, several months in the freezer.

Probiotic beef broth recipe

Beef broths can be rich and filling with all the fat. So, if you’re sensitive to this you need to remove most of the fat which is easily done. You can also remove visible fat on the bones or trimmings before you start boiling them.

Just before serving the broth, add some fermented vegetable. A probiotic bone broth gets a bit tangier and more refreshing.

Ingredients

• 2-5 pounds beef bones
• 1 teaspoon roughly crushed black peppers
• 1-2 tablespoons vinegar
• 3 chopped celery stalks
• A little tomato paste
• 1-2 chopped onions
• 2 chipped carrots
• 2 bay leaves

Direction

1. Add bones and trimmings to a pot.
2. For more flavor, lightly brown the bones in a little butter for 5-10 minutes
3. Add water until it covers the ingredients
4. Bring to a boil, gently simmer for1 10-24 hours (around 4 hours in a pressure cooker)
5. An hour or two before the broth is ready, add the vegetables
6. When the broth has cooled the fat will sit on top and can be easily removed.

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