Bone Broth

Bone broth is a soup stock made from animal bones and cartilage that has become very popular due to its perceived health benefits. According to Tod Cooperman, MD, of ConsumerLab.com, it can in fact be a healthful food. But as often happens, as soon as anything gets a reputation - deserved or not - for being healthful we start to see it on our grocery store shelves and the commercial version often delivers far less of the healthy ingredient than what is needed to have any impact.

The health benefits of bone broth derive from the significant amount of the protein collagen that it contains when traditionally prepared (i.e., when you make it yourself at home). The problem is that store bought versions can vary significantly in the amount of collagen that they actually deliver. Collagen levels are not required to be listed on nutrition labels and so - surprise!! - they rarely are. The nutritional information that companies do provide clearly comes from their marketing departments and is often wildly inaccurate.

What to do if you want to make bone broth a part of your diet? Make it yourself. Its pretty simple, here is a basic recipe to get you started.

If you prefer to buy your broth at the grocery store, do a little research first. There are some good ones out there but you want one that delivers lots of collagen for the price and you want that verified by an independent testing lab.
Here are two that, according to ConsumerLab, you can trust:

Jarrow Formulas Beyond Bone Broth Spicy Beef Ramen Flavor (powder).

Pacific Organic Bone Broth Chicken (liquid).