1-cup and 2-cup bags of brown stock

I wasn’t even thinking about making stock when I went into the Big Apple Meat Mart on Ninth Avenue the other day. But, I had to change my plans for the rest of the day when I saw the pan full of fresh beef bones they had on the last speed-rack. By fresh, I mean they were FRESH. I think they had just been cut and packed that day. Usually the bones on sale at grocery stores, those that even sell them, are frozen, or were frozen and thawed. Being fresh is a great advantage, because the bones brown better and more evenly than if they had been frozen. Anyway, I bought four packages of bones (@ $0.98/lb) and two packages of neck bones (@ $1.98/lb), amounting to about 12 pounds, took them home and busted them open. The bones smelled fresh, and the meat on the bones was bright red.

Big Apple packs the bones neatly like meat, rather than throwing them in a bag like other stores do.

After a few more visits to the Market, I realized these top-quality bones are a regular offering. They’re not always in stock, because restaurants and people like me buy out what they have quickly to make large amounts of stock. But that’s a good thing–this quick turnover ensures that whatever’s on the shelf will be fresh as can be. It’s a very nice feeling, having found a reliable supplier of cheap, high quality, not-frozen bones.

I also bought a bunch of veal bones at Big Apple, which I used to make veal stock and demi-glace.

Bones before roasting

I coated the bones with tomato paste and roasted them on a couple half sheet pans for about an hour. When making a brown stock, some type of tomato product (paste, puree, diced tomatoes, etc.) is useful as it provides acidity to help break down the connective tissue in the meat and release it from the bones, adds color to the stock and, if added before roasting, adds moisture to prevent the bones from burning.

Bones after roasting

When the bones were evenly browned, I added them to the stockpot (my enormous 40-quart pot) and got the water started. It took almost an hour to come to a boil as its volume was so great. Meanwhile, I poured out the extra fat from the roasting pans, and browned the mirepoix (onions, carrots, and celery). When the vegetables were nicely caramelized, I added them to the pot, deglazed the roasting pans to free up the fond, and added this bit of flavor to the pot, along with a sachet of bay leaves, peppercorns, whole garlic cloves, parsley stems, and thyme. I didn’t wrap the sachet in cheesecloth, as the herbs will be strained out anyway, but I will next time, to make it easier to skim the surface by not having herbs floating around.

Adding the mirepoix for browning

Once everything was in the pot and the water had come to a near boil, I let it simmer for 8 hours. I would have let it gone a few hours longer, to extract those last traces of flavor from the bones, had I started earlier in the day. As it was I wouldn’t be off to bed until dawn, and I didn’t feel like leaving the stock on the heat overnight.

I could still have fit several pounds more of bones in the huge pot.

The stock comes off the heat, and now comes the hard part: discarding the 10+ pounds of solids, and straining and cooling the stock. Removing the solids took a good half hour, as I let them drain well so I wouldn’t end up throwing away valuable stock. I had bought a couple bags of ice from the bodega across the street and used these to make an ice bath in the sink; cooling took about an hour. I was left with a little more than a gallon of dark, rich brown beef stock. When cooled, it was just like beef jello.

The dark stock bubbling gently

I’ll be using this batch of stock for soups, braising, and pan sauces, so I wanted to have easy access to it in small amounts. I froze the stock in 1- and 2-cup amounts in quart-size freezer bags, laid flat on a sheet pan in the freezer until firm. Once frozen, the stock is easily broken in half; for example, if I need only 4 ounces of stock for a pan sauce, I can just break a 1-cup bag in half. Having all types of stock in the freezer at all times makes cooking at home a great joy. Try this sometime, it will give you an easy one-up on the big-time restaurant guys.