The Bare Bones Broth Cookbook: 125 Gut-Friendly Recipes to Heal, Strengthen, and Nourish the Body

by Katherine Harvey

Bone broth is just about as elemental as it gets. For centuries all across the world, cultures have been reaping both the flavor and the nutritional benefits of slowly simmered broth. And yet, as with most aspects of our food culture, we’ve wandered far away from one of the most basic and essential ingredients to all of cooking. The convenience of processed and packaged broth in a box has ousted homemade broths to the detriment of our health and taste buds.

Now, in The Bare Bones Broth Cookbook, small-batch broth company founders Katherine and Ryan Harvey take the guesswork out of making authentic bone broth at home, providing foolproof recipes for meat, fish, poultry, and vegetable broths—as well as more than 75 inventive ideas for incorporating broth into a wide variety of dishes. From on-the-go beverages like their Coconut and Lime Sipping Broth or Carrot and Orange Smoothie to seasonally inspired soups to hearty mains like Tomatillo-Cilantro Pulled Pork and Fig-Braised Chicken with Spiced Walnuts—the Harveys explain how easy it is to enhance the taste and nutritional value of any meal while also helping you save money and reduce waste. 

And through it all, they offer insightful kitchen pointers, ingredient tutorials, and an overview of the myriad and astonishing health benefits of this modern day elixir. Just as real, slow-cooked bone broth is essential to delicious, nourishing food, The Bare Bones Broth Cookbook is essential to any cookbook collection.

Advance Praise for The Bare Bones Broth Cookbook

“Once considered a professional chef’s secret ingredient, bone broth is now finding its way into kitchens everywhere—to the benefit of our taste buds and our overall health. The Bare Bones Broth Cookbook offers delicious and inventive new ways to use this nourishing ingredient in everyday meals.” —Diane Sanfilippo, New York Times bestselling author of Practical Paleo and The 21-Day Sugar Detox

“Elevate your culinary home to luscious new levels by using this well-researched and insightful book, chock full of delicious broth recipes for both meal planning and your morning mug.” —Adam Danforth, James Beard Award–winning butcher and author of Butchering Poultry, Rabbit, Lamb, Goat, and Pork

Genres: Cookbooks, Reference, Nonfiction, Health, Food, Cooking, Nutrition

338 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 19, 2016

Reviews

[Mischenko · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Bare Bones Broth Cookbook by Ryan and Kate Harvey is a good basic starter book for learning how to make bone broth. However, I wasn't very fond of the recipes included that comprised the broth. Therefore, it's not a keeper for me.

3***

[Gwendolyn Brooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are unfamiliar with the advantages of homemade bone broth, and, are looking for a beginner's primer on how to make it, and, how to use it as a base for a host of other nutritious and filling recipes, you need this book! As a 20+ year sufferer of Crohn's disease, I have found that homemade bone broth is one of the few foods that I can always eat, no matter how severe my symptoms may happen to be, and, as I have long suspected, it does contain the building blocks that our body needs to repair our immune system, and a host of tissues, organs and more. Highly recommend this book.

[Christina · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has a decent amount of recipes using broth, but not as many actual broth recipes as I hoped. But that makes sense because how many ways can you cook bones into broth? The quantities the recipes call for seem a bit much for the average person, but since the authors own a broth company it makes sense they use large amounts. But how hard is it for them to scale it down for the book?

I wish the sipping broth section was longer, but I did like the suggestion to use plain broth in smoothies.

The authors are not medical professionals so take their advice with a grain of salt.

I got this book on the discount rack with a gift card so I didn't actually spend my own money. I'm glad, because I don't think this is worth the cost. Get the book from the library or just google some broth recipes instead.

[Karla · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't help it, I love new cookbooks! I had the opportunity to borrow this one via Amazon Prime and really enjoyed it. So many single focus cookbooks are over burdened with commentary and recipes that have to work too hard to be different from each other. This cook book actually shone through in variety, and achievability when it came to making the broths. This is a good book to have on hand and add to your collection of support cookbooks.

[Rebecca Sheehan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of great ideas

Good adventure for cooks. The greatest challenge, as almost always is the case these days, is finding some of the ingredients. They do a fair job of offering some substitutions.

[Elisabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome primer for those looking to incorporate bone broth into their diets. I’ve made my own before, but I’m happy to have learned more tips on how to make it the most nutritious.

The included recipes that utilize the various broths really sound delicious, and I can’t wait to try some.

[Catherine Edmundson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was thrilled with this cookbook. i enjoyed the fabulous & delicious recipes and appreciated the narratives explaining why certain ingredients and cooking techniques are important.

[Red · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wasn't sure what reaction I would have to the book, but then I got into the recipes and now I really do want to "cook (my) way through the pages."

As a parent with an enormously picky eater, who is incredibly hesitant to try foods, and flat-out refuses to eat meat (if he knows it's there), the juice and smoothie section gives me a ton of hope for these upcoming weeks (Tonsils are coming out) especially as a way to get protein into his system, and encourage him to try new flavors.

I'm off to Amazon to load up on the book and the broth.

[Michele Hayes · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars || Love it even if just for the sipping broth chapter 😋 Probably even more useful for someone who may be unfamiliar with bone broth.

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been turning the bones of turkey and chicken carcasses into broth for years. It was nice to learn a few new tips of things to add to get more nutrients out of the bones and the health reasons behind why it's so good for the body. Now I might kick it up a notch and do some beef and other kinds of broth. If I'm really feeling crazy I'll add chicken feet.

[Dora · Rating 3 out of 5]

Recipes look very good, but once again, I do not think I can find the required ingredients at my local grocer. Never have seen a crockpot large enough to handle the recipes (12 quart), and I worry about keeping a 12 quart stock pot boiling on my electric stove top for twenty plus hours to cook the bone broth down. I bet it is delicious though!

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent Cookbook!

[Lisa Adey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been making my own stock for years but now I can make it even better & am looking forward to trying my next batch with my new found knowledge.

[Patricia Swenson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Many recipes to put bone broth into. Very detailed explanation of benefits of using. Base recipes for beef, chicken etc. broths.

[Denise]

I have not got it yet.

[Liz · Rating 2 out of 5]

This reads like a recipe/cooking blog and less like a book. The tone is not great. It's a cookbook that wants to be a health living website. The recipes seem fine for the most part. I think they've missed a great opportunity to revive hand pies in the states since many of them use broths (especially bone broths) for the liquid inside.

If you're cooking these recipes, please, respect your shrimp and don't leave the tails on if it's in a dish. If you're intending to eat it with your hands, by all means. However, if you're serving a soup or stew with tails on, don't leave them on unless you are intending for someone to eat them. (You've already made the stock. What are you doing? Trying to thicken it with that smidge of shrimp butt shell?)

Lastly, they make several health claims and refer to a lot of studies generally without citing or specifying them for their ingredient choices. There are some broad claims made throughout, but the last page is a notice that the book isn't giving you real medical advice. Cite your work! I know it's a cookbook, but as soon as you lay health claims out there, you need to cite your work and “all efforts [being] made to endure the accuracy of information” is not really a catch all for those claims. And you can't say X ingredient is good for you because science and then claim to not be giving medical/health advice.