Bone Broth – A Fad or a Lasting Favourite . . .

Bone Broth - A restorative cure-all . . .

Beef bone broth is competing with coffee when it comes to getting a daily dose to start your day – many people are already foregoing a cup of coffee for a steaming hot brew of bone broth.  Initially gaining popularity with those on paleo diets, bone broth is now being quoted as a restorative cure-all, and in the United States it’s reached new levels of appeal with it being served in takeaway cups from restaurant windows and soup baristas on the streets.  Is it a fad or a lasting favourite?

Bone broth has been around for a long long time – It was part of the Palaeolithic diet when humans started cooking over fires – our hunter-gatherer ancestors started making bone broth out of necessity.  With successful hunts a rare event, every part of the animal was precious, not just the muscle meat we’re familiar with.  During the Middle Ages Europeans drank a broth called restaurer, meaning ‘to restore’. The English have sipped on beef tea since the Victorian era, and in Asia, bone broth never disappeared so it can’t really be called a trend.  Big tanks of soup are a common sight in markets across Asia and in fine-dining restaurants chefs brew premium stock or ‘gao tang’ for their dishes.  In Korea a traditional broth is created called seolleongtang – one of Korean clients purchase our bone broth for creating this nutritious dish.  In Chinese medicine dating back over 2,500 years, bone broth is used as a digestive aid, a blood strengthener and a support to kidney health.  Bone broth was valued by these cultures because it’s packed with nutrients, easy to digest, rich in flavour, and loaded with restorative amino acids.

In recent years, the bone broth business has become very popular in western cultures.  As the Paleo diet became prominent, so did bone broth – it plays a main part in this low-carb, high-protein diet.  The bone broth craze has come across the western world in recent years, particularly strong in the United States, and supported by celebrities – chefs like Marco Canora of the New York restaurant Hearth have started selling broth like coffee in a take-away cup. Supermarkets are filled with various brands of bone broth developed by chefs and nutritionists who have experienced the health enriching benefits for themselves.

From a nutritional perspective bone broth is a rich source of collagen and glucosamine which helps protect the joints and improves skin elasticity.  Glycine found in bone broth helps ward off fatigue.  The gelatin that is extracted from the bones during the cooking process also helps with gut health, and phosphorus, magnesium and calcium in the bones provides essential nutrients for healthy bones. Millennials with a strong focus on health are popular customers for bone broth, and consume it in all forms from powder and health bars through to the broth itself as a tonic.

At Taranaki Bio Extracts we believe beef bone broth is a lasting favourite.  Ours is crafted by simmering bones in water with fresh vegetables and herbs to draw out all the nutrients and minerals into the liquid.  The Maillard reaction creates unique flavours and produces an ingredient that can be used as a base for other dishes, or supplied to companies to be sold as a broth in itself.  We supply a number of food and nutraceutical manufacturers with our beef bone broth and a range of other beef bone extracts.  To learn more about these visit Our range of natural food ingredients | Taranaki Bio Extracts