Bone broth is one of the most nutritious foods for oral health because it’s high in collagen for strong, flexible gum tissue and mineral-rich for remineralizing tooth enamel. It’s also inexpensive and easy to make yourself!
Whether you are a habitual bone broth brewer or you’ve never even tried, you can vary your broth to suit your priorities:
FAST? EASY? CHEAP?
It’s all good!
Choose the bones
The best bones come from organic or wild animals.
For fast bone broth: Fish bones (and fish heads) make the fastest bone broth. The thinner the bones, the quicker they give up rich mineral goodness and fish bones only need up to an hour of simmering for an exceptionally nutritious broth.
(Chicken bone broth takes up to 24 hours of simmering and beef bones can simmer for up to 72 hours.)
For easy bone broth: Save your leftovers. Any time you roast a whole chicken, grill some T-bone steaks, or roast a leg of lamb you’ll have bones left over at the end.
Don’t throw them out! If you don’t want to make your broth immediately, store the bones in the freezer until you are ready.
For cheap bone broth: If you know someone who hunts or fishes, ask them if you can have the bones whenever they are successful. Otherwise look out for inexpensive bags of beef bones, fish heads, or chicken carcasses in the freezer section of your butcher or meat counter.
Choose the cooking container
The bigger your cooking container, the easier it is to make therapeutic quantities of broth on a regular basis.
For fast bone broth: If you have an instant pot (pressure cooker) you can make bone broth much more quickly than any other method!
For easy bone broth: If you have a slow cooker (crock pot) bone broth can be a set-and-forget cooking project.
For cheap bone broth: Use your biggest cooking pot and simmer on the lowest heat.
Choose the additions
Add a splash of vinegar to any broth to help draw out more of the nutrients.
For fast bone broth: Make a bland broth with nothing but bones and water. Bland broth makes a good base for smoothies and any kind of cooking where you don’t want the broth flavor to dominate.
For easy bone broth: Use whatever fresh vegetables or herbs you happen to have available.
Onion, carrot, and celery are tried and true. Add bay leaf, thyme, and parsley for a Euro-flavor profile or ginger, garlic, and chilli for a more Asian-flavor profile. Or, even easier, add a stock cube for flavor.
For cheap bone broth: Keep a big sturdy ziplock bag in the freezer to collect vegetable scraps e.g. onion ends, carrot peels, leek leaves, and parsley stalks. Add any vegetables in your kitchen that are starting to get limp but not rotten, or vegetables from your garden that are over- or under-ripe or going to seed.
When you’re ready to cook withdraw a couple of handfuls at a time for a small broth batch or dump the whole bag to make a big broth. No need to thaw first.
Pro tip: chop the scraps into small pieces before you freeze them to release more flavor into the broth.
Choose what’s next
Once the broth is cooked, strain out all the solids. You can cook the bones again to simmer for another (less flavorful but still nutritious) broth.
For fast bone broth: make into a soup straight away by following your favorite recipe or adding some fresh vegetables to simmer until soft enough to blend or mash.
For easy bone broth: Transfer cooled broth to a jar in the fridge then heat up one cup at a time with a sachet or spoonful of miso paste for a hearty drink
For cheap bone broth: Make broth in bulk to store in the freezer. Store in big containers for when you plan to make it into family-sized meals. Freeze in muffin cups for single serves or ice cube trays for when you just need a tablespoon of broth for a recipe. Transfer portions to a sealed bag once frozen so they’ll last longer.
For more simple suggestions for food to help regenerate teeth and gums check out
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Has a dentist told you that your cavities or receding gums are your fault because you are drinking too much Coke, you don’t floss enough or you need to stop breastfeeding your baby? And you know that isn’t true!
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Nature or nurture, ancestry or environment, free will or systemic oppression, unconscious emotions or the degraded food system
These are the factors that make your teeth and gums vulnerable to disease.
Even though your tooth decay and gum disease is not your fault, it is within your power to change.
You can turn your oral health around with natural strategies and healthy habits.