Cooking stocks are basic recipes of modern Italian and French cuisine, widely used in gourmet kitchens by top chefs. They are divided into light stocks (like fish fumet) and dark meat and vegetable stocks.
Today we’ll make the Brown Stock, the original recipe. The brown stock or dark stock, is an amber, thick and flavorful sauce, rich in umami, obtained from bones and meat trimmings — in this case beef — to which vegetables, tomato paste and aromatics are added. A true recipe of recovery that becomes a gourmet sauce, ideal to accompany roasts and excellent to enrich filled fresh pasta and risottos.
The brown beef stock recipe is not difficult, but it requires some of your time and your passion: the bones are first roasted in the oven, then cooked slowly with the meat and aromatics. Once strained and still hot, the stock is fluid, but letting it reduce over low heat it will change texture, becoming darker, more flavorful, glossy, dense and amber.
Let’s go to the kitchen now and discover together how to prepare brown beef stock and how to make a stock cube with leftover meat and vegetables. But first, remember you can follow my Facebook page (here) and my Instagram profile (here).
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- Difficulty: Medium
- Cost: Medium
- Rest time: 3 Hours
- Preparation time: 10 Hours
- Portions: about 3.4 fl oz
- Cooking methods: Stovetop
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: All seasons
Ingredients to make brown beef stock
- 4.4 lb beef (bones cut into small pieces)
- 4 carrots
- 4 stalks celery
- 2 onions (medium)
- 2 sprigs rosemary
- 4 leaves bay leaves
- to taste thyme
- 1 1/4 cups red wine
- 6 tbsp butter (about 3 oz)
- 4 cloves garlic
- 4 leaves sage
- to taste marjoram
- to taste whole peppercorns
- 4 tbsp tomato paste
- 4.4 lb ice
- to taste salt
Tools
- Pot
- Oven
- Strainers
- Pot small
- Bowl
- Skimmer
- Refrigerator
- Baking pan
Preparation
To make brown stock, ask your butcher for bones that still have some meat attached and, of course, some marrow. If you wish, you can also add pieces of beef, chicken or pork, or even some pork bones.
Let’s begin preparing the brown stock. Gather the bones in a roasting pan and roast them in a hot oven at 392°F for 35-40 minutes. They should darken and you should be able to smell them throughout the house.
Now gather in a very large, heavy-bottomed pot all the vegetables roughly chopped and the garlic, add the butter and start sautéing over high heat. Add all the aromatics and the tomato paste and cook until the vegetables begin to stick to the bottom; stir often and do not let them burn.
Add the bones and two-thirds of the juices you find in the roasting pan — even if fatty, they are the juices and flavors of the bones and meat. If you want to add pieces of meat, add them now.
Cook over high heat for 2-3 minutes, stirring often to let the ingredients flavor each other. Add the ice — the thermal shock from the ice will rapidly lower the temperature and help extract all the juices and flavors from the ingredients. As soon as the ice has melted and everything comes to a boil, add a teaspoon of salt, lower the heat to the minimum and let it simmer gently for at least 6 hours with the lid slightly ajar.
If impurities come to the surface at the beginning, skim them off with a strainer. After the time has passed, the bone broth will have reduced considerably; use a skimmer to remove all the larger pieces of bones, vegetables, meat, leaves and spices, and set them aside to make a homemade meat stock cube that is more genuine and healthy (I explain everything in the next recipe).
Boil the stock for 30 minutes over high heat, then strain several times through a fine strainer into a bowl. Bring to room temperature and refrigerate for 3 hours. You will see the fatty layer separate from the gelatinized protein portion (which is simply your stock thickened and gelatinized due to the collagen in the meat and bones). With a spoon, remove all the solidified fat and discard it.
Return the stock to the stovetop, adjust salt if necessary and let it reduce further over moderate heat until you reach a thick, amber consistency.
Pour into a bowl and here you have it — in the end we obtained about 100 ml (about 3.4 fl oz) or a little more of delicious brown stock.
Storage and tips
Brown stock can be stored in the refrigerator for one week, well sealed in an airtight container, or it can be frozen in small single portions in an ice cube tray so you can thaw only the amount needed to flavor your dishes.
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