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After being fully inspired by Paleobird's post on eating more fat, I've decided to count my calories and lower my protein/carb intake. I've never made bone broth before and have also decided to incorporate it into my diet. With that in mind, how do you guys calculate the number of calories in bone broth?
[URL="http://www.livestrong.com/article/368293-chicken-broth-nutrition/"]This[/URL] is from Livestrong. I was thinking I read 40 calories, that must be beef. This says chicken is more like 18.
I think this definitely depends on your water-to-bones ratio. A super-complicated and annoying way to do it if you really want to be exact is to weigh the bones before you boil them, then weigh the bones again after the broth is done. The difference in weight would be how much marrow/fat/cartilage/etc. has melted into the broth. Then find a Calorie-calculator online and figure out how many Calories that mass of fat is. That would be how many Calories are in the entire batch of broth (since water has no Calories).
But, if you want to get a general idea, the other comment is the way to go.
Yal see when I made mine, right or wrong, I ran it all through the blender. I didnt throw anything away. Talking chicken for mine. I also didnt have much skin or fat. These were just leftovers from some baked chickens.
I just find the closest approximation in any calorie-counter. Since I skim off the fat after it hardens in the fridge (and save it for other things), I consider my bone broth to have the calories of any fat-free broths out there. It might not be exactly the same, but I think it's close enough. Of course I have to ignore sodium content and whatever else since my broth has lots of gelatin and probably way more minerals and vitamins.
Thanks everyone! Guess I'll just kinda wing it for now. It's not like I'm going to be drinking gallons of it everyday.
Thanks for posting this. I was trying to figure it out last night too. I am trying to drink a cup a day. I feel better about it now.
I don't even count it. As for calories, I couldn't even begin to guess. Everybody makes theirs a little differently, and every batch is going to vary widely.
I make it, let it cool off and pour it into freezer trays and freeze it, extra goes into jars to thaw later to reload the trays. Might eat one or two cubes a day, toss them into my greens. The fat stays on top, frozen. I do simmer it down when making it, try to reduce the water content way down so it is more dense, easier to store, etc.