Go to the Recipe: Ultimate Beef Bouillon Cubes
The interesting history of "Pocket Soup":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHICMQ1YDm4
I’ve made this a ton now, including right now for my au jus base for Xmas prime rib.
To avoid any fat issues, when the step comes to transfer from one pot to another, I reduce it down to 3-4 cups in the first pot, then transfer it to my fat separator, and pour it from there into the smaller pot, keeping most of the fat in the fat separator. Then reduce to the final amount. Works every time and eliminates any stress as it gets closer to the final amount.
Could these be used inside a soup dumpling or will they not melt enough without boiling water over the top? Also I assume I’d have to adjust the salt so they don’t overpower.
When asked about where the MSG was located, a Kroger helper said that she wasn’t sure but recommended that I try their over-the-counter pharmacy area - got a good laugh out of that response.
If you know anyone who keeps chickens their birds will enjoy the leftovers. Quail might like this too, but I’m not positive.
There is way to much onion and garlic in the solids for a dog.
_Pe_rhaps feed it to your dog - it still has protein and the fat is separated.
hi Kyl. What can I do with all the Strained Solids? anything good?
Thanks for the feedback, Greg; I'll pass the message to our editor.
Kyl, just noticed the body of your verbiage still says 80/20 while the recipe says 90/10. I bought 80/20, but will only use 1/2 the fat that comes off (edit, never mind, you put that in a note at the bottom…maybe direct the reader to the note** at the first mention?)
Yes, transferring just helps you have a bit more control at the end of the reduction; a larger Dutch oven will go very fast right at the end.
I would avoid the xanthan gum and just reduce it a touch less, you can also let it cool slightly more in the pan and give it a good mix before setting it in the molds.
Reading the note of the switch to 90/10 and some folks having issues with separation, would adding some Xanthan Gum help prevent this? And if so, when would it be wise to add the Xanthan? I made this once and didn’t have it separate, but just wondering if this would work. I will also add, I used 1 pound of 85/15 and 1 pound of 93/7 when I made this. The 93/7 was a mistake on a grocery delivery.
Your math isn’t mathing.
Why does the recipe say to transfer to a 3 quart saucepan? Can’t you just continue to reduce in the dutch oven?
Of course.
Hi, can I use olive oil? instead of canola oil?
I haven't, to be honest, as the meat I've used quotes itself as 10% (80/10) fat beef mince and 7% (93/7) fat turkey mince. However, you may be right about the true fat content. I've been leaving the fat all in for flavour, as you say, and hoping for a stable emulsification. I just took the cubes out of the freezer and chucked them all in the pan again to reduce to see if it was a matter of not enough reduction, but it's looking like the same may happen again. Don't worry, I believe it's not a fault of the recipe, as there's many people who have had success! But I just wonder what could be the mitigating factor that's preventing me from getting that picture perfect cube.
EDIT: aged second refrigeration, the cubes seem to be more stable. One or two have excess fat lingering on top that refused to freeze and had to be scooped off, but the rest are seemingly 98% emulsified, albeit, a little sticky and greasy. Maybe you're right about the fat content on the packs being a lie?
Sorry your having an issue with this one. I have also had the separation a few times, and just had it happen with a round of beef i was doing. Like you i think sometimes some additional fat is helpful to sear and get the meat browned. Have you tried to strain the fat off before adding the water? I tend to like to leave it as it is flavor but you might just have some higher fat content meats and are pushing the emulsion to its max.
I've tried this recipe once, and the chicken bouillon one two (albeit replacing the chicken thigh mince with turkey thigh mince-lo and behold, there's now a turkey bouillon cube recipe ). Every time, I cannot get a stable emulsion during the reduction step, even if the amount of reduced liquid is more than what the recipe states. The liquid looks syrupy and emulsified, but by the time the cubes are set, they have separated into a distinct, albeit gelatinised layer of stock and fat. I follow the recipe to a T, except I use 1kg of meat (packs of minced meat are 500g here in the UK), and do the browning step on the stovetop before transferring to my instant pot, because the instant pot gets overcrowded and doesn't brown properly. I also increase the cooking time to about 40 minutes to account for the PSI difference). I find that the amount of oil in the browning step doesn't provide a sufficient medium to brown adequately and provide a sufficient fond with no deep browning (as opposed to the light browning called for in the recipe). Any idea what I'm doing wrong? The flavours of the cubes are amazing, but I want to get that picture perfect emulsified cube, especially since each of cubes have different amounts of fat layers.
Following up on this, if you are vegetarian and okay with gelatin, then Impossible Meat should be a perfect sub for the ground beef. Only real issue is that it's 80/20 vs 90/10, like the recipe is now, so I am guessing that the added oil needs to be reduced or removed.
So glad to hear your enjoying it.
Made these tonight. Absolutely beautiful reduction! This recipe is insanely accurate. Yielded exactly eight 35g cubes with only what coated the measuring cup left. It’s obvious that a lot of testing and validation went into this one. Thanks for all of the obvious hard work.
PS I thought I would get smart and save a dish, so I poured straight from the pressure cooker into a saucepan to reduce. While it worked, it definitely added a lot of time to the reduction process. Probably reduced for two hours I would bet. Stick to what the pros say.
When will you make bullion that I can Purchase? It would be fantastic.
nope. use what you can get ahold of.
One of the key components of these cubes is gelatin, and there is just not a great replacement that would work well with a vegetable stock.
What you recommend for vegetarian version of this? Would be cool to have vegetarian/vegan recipe
do i have to use Knox gelatin? I don't have it in my country.
A long process that uses left over scraps of beef with a definite reward. Not a waste of time.
Made 3L of stock. After I reduced it by a third I strained it through a sieve, big tea strainer and finally on a old gold coffee filter. Cleared up the stock pretty well collecting the finer bits of swarf. Thing I was aware of was how quickly the last 15% (or so) of water left the reduction. The bubbles became much finer at the end with the pot temp raising quickly though not scorching (it got to about 217F).
This was fun, actually. Searching around town to find MSG, the look on peoples faces when i asked where it was (at a whole-istic market...) "Sir we don't have those kind of ingredients," "You mean next to the pink salt, xyla or was it oreo's?"
What a waste of time.
I'm excited to make this. Thanks for the recipe, especially as it uses ground meat and gelatin to streamline the process. I've done something similar by cooking veal bones, water and aromatics for hours and reducing it down until it was essentially glue - then chilling and cutting up the pieces for the freezer. One question I have is - what is the rationale of using oil, along with beef with 10% fat as opposed to just starting with no oil and beef with 20% fat?
Thanks Kyl! Was thinking you were sick of me with all of my posting! Haha
For a pho application, at what scale would you prefer to go essential oils of the aromatic spices for an "instant" route, rather than steep whole spice in hot water before reconstituting the bouillon cube (assuming would be the proportions of the beef sipping broth)?
Give it a try Kristie. I developed this with the correct amount of ingredients if you started with 1 gallon of water. Then reduced the whole thing. I then cut the water volume in half, since you are going to reduce the entire pot down any way and wanted to cut the reduction time in half. We tested both versions side by side and there was no noticeable difference so went with the 2kg as the starting point The pressure cooking is extracting all of the flavor you can get out of those ingredients, regardless of the water volume. Then reduction is just concentrating them into a smaller package.
Duh. Yes, 1 gallon. But still. How does bouillon made with 2 qts of water reconstitute to 4 qts of stock? After pressure cooking the stock, it doesn’t have enough flavor, and thus would have to be reduced to use as stock in soup or sauce or whatever. After reducing, how can it be flavorful enough when adding twice as much water as we started with? Just can’t get my brain around that.
Ready for ramen
Sorry I missed this one! I would stick with 2 quarts of liquid, but only use 3 cubes instead of 4. To cut back on the salt. Unless you have modified your cubes to be less salty I think the combination of them and the ranch powder will be too much. You could probably also drop the added gelatin in the pot roast recipe as well.
1 gallon
Well, the reduced stock is really very delicious and has a superb mouthfeel. BUT, I have a hard time envisioning how a stock made with 2 qts of water can end up as 2 gallons of broth (8 cubes, each making 2 cups of broth). And mine never did emulsify…no clue why. 1 ended up skimming off most of the fat that rose to the surface.
We do not.
Does Chef Steps sell the bouillon cubes?
Kyl for the Not Your Grandmas’s Pot Roast, should I just dissolve a cube in 300g of water, add the pepper the recipe calls for to it, and then it’s good to go?
Made Red Wine Braised Short Ribs in the pressure cooker. Reduced 1/2 cup of balsamic vinegar, then reduced 2 cups of red wine to 1 cup, then added 4 cups of water and 1.5 cubes of bouillon, threw the top on and cooked at 2 bars for 45 minutes. After cooking I strained the liquid, defatted it, and reduced down to 1.5/2 cups. Taste is awesome.
Makes sense. Thanks for the feedback 😁👍
It was really just a choice to leave the base as neutral as possible. I wouldn't say that if we added tomato paste that it would be ideal for some dishes such as Pho, or other asian inspired dishes. But it is super easy to add a little into what ever dish you are wanting that flavor profile in.
Hey Kyl I was just wondering if there was a particular reason that the recipe didn't call for tomato paste with how it was mentioned to be used in stocks or broths in the description above or was it just personal choice?
Absolutely replaces boxed stock for me and probably homemade beef stock. I only ever reduced beef stock to a demi anyway. This is cheaper and quicker. Chicken stock I’ll still do in the pressure cooker for soups and gravys and whatever.
Love it. I've been doing a pasta dish at home with spicy Italian sausage, white wine, and butter with half a cube added in and it's amazing. These things are pretty darn useful. I have personally replaced box stock at my house with it.
Thinking about the fat in this and trying to come up with the nutritional info in my food app has been interesting/confusing.
300g total - 40g salt & MSG - 40g gelatin - 28g oil = 192g absorbed water + beef fat.
Gelatin can absorb about 5x its weight of water but is not fat soluble, so 200g of water could be retained (maximum and at cool temps). Clearly we evaporate a good part of that.
I'm no food scientist so I could be totally off with this. I think some percentage of the fat will remain in the meat and be discarded, but I'll assume it all gets into the mix from the pressure cooker. If we drove off enough water to make room in the 192g for all of the available beef fat (up to the full 176g in 2 lb of 80/20 meat), we only have 16g of water "wiggle room". If we drive that last bit off, is that when it breaks? Less fat, like with the 8% chicken I also used, leaves a lot more water in the 300g target. Since there is only 72 g of meat fat in the first place, we are left with 120g of water in the cubes to bond with the gelatin (which is within the 200g max so they are completely gelled at room temp). And if we overcook that a little there is still water in the mix. If this is directionally correct, 85/15 beef will offer up a max of 132 g of fat, leaving 60g water in the 300g mix, enough for a factor of safety to not break, and still contribute a good amount of fat/flavor.
TLDR: 20% fat meat should work in theory for max fat/flavor retention, but leaves little room for error and risks driving off all the water to reach the 280-300g target. 15% fat might offer more of a factor of safety, while still imparting a lot of fat and flavor.
I sauted some mushrooms tonight, deglazed with some red wine, and a quarter cube of the bouillon. Stirred in a little butter off heat and it was incredible.
Yea that must be from the ground beef being fattier than what we developed, I never had a layer form during my reduction. Super excited that you're enjoying the package though. It was a fun one.
I ground my own chicken thighs so no idea about the fat content, but it was absolutely less than the beef. I think the fat is the factor here.
Thanks for your reply! So some fat emulsified, but never all of it so as it reduced the stock part got smaller, but the fat remained the same so when I reduced it to 300g, the stock was reduced to 200g and the fat made up the other 100g. That 200g of stock though was SO reduced it was like taffy and unusable. I thought I split it the first time around but on my second time around I noticed that there was a layer of fat just sitting on top and it became more noticeable as it reduced. Hence I skimmed it off and was able to get a proper 280g stock reduction that worked perfectly. Really great technique though and if you check the chicken recipe you’ll see that one works flawlessly!
Glad you liked it, it is looking like the 80-20 we developed with might have been leaner than the products the majority of you all are getting. I'll run a trial this week with 90-10 and see if that makes a big difference. If you keep having this issue I would personally add 10-20g of water after letting the pot cool down slightly, while whisking to see if that helps the emulsion. Then cast.
Hi Robert, for the most part every store is going to label their 80-20 ground meat and it won't be super consistent from store to store or really day to day. I made many many batches of this one from a couple of different locations and didn't have a breaking issue. But I do aim for closer to a 300g final weight so you might have to adjust a slight amount of water. Going to the 90/10 could be a safe bet for the product you are getting, I can just say that I never trialed it. Thank you for the feed back and glad you are trying it out. And since you are having this issue with your product I would certainly suggest a skim or pour off after the rendering bit.
I made the chicken bouillon last night and had no issue with it breaking, but I used store-bought ground chicken with 8% fat versus the 20% beef. I also did 1.5x recipe since the chicken was a 3-lb pack. I thought the extra liquid relative to pan surface area might have been the difference, but the fat is certainly a variable as well.
Yep. Much better. Not milky at all.
Did the beef again. You need to strain the fat at some point (I did it around 1000g). That much fat won’t emulsify and then when you weigh it, you end up reducing the stock WAY past where you want to. I strained the fat and then took it down to 280 and it seems to be perfect. Definitely more involved than the chicken one. Used an additional strainer to remove any clumps while straining it to a pyrex that I used to pour it into the molds.
Could probably go with a 90/10 ground beef as well?
I’m doing it again with the normal amount and I eventually skimmed the fat off. There is so much fat. It isn’t emulsifying. I think it’s an issue with this recipe. The chicken worked flawlessly (haven’t tried the pork yet).
I did a half batch two days ago and broke it at the end. I was reducing to shoot for 150 g and it broke around 155 g. I used a 4 qt saucepan and I think I should have moved it to something with less surface area. I whisked it before pouring it into the ice cube tray, but it separated again. It’s about 2/3 “stock” and 1/3 fat in the cubes. That said, today I made the beef sipping broth and it was fantastic. Dissolved in 30-60 seconds, made a velvety broth, and I drank all three cups. Which, according to my math, is over 1,500 mg sodium… speaking of, it was perfectly seasoned to my taste. I’ll see how it is with the 2 cups water for regular stock. I was thinking this might just taste like hamburger soup but now I think this will be a game-changer and free up a lot of freezer space between bone bags and deli containers of stock.
Not caramelized, the consistency of caramel.
I actually ended up with exactly double the yield. I thought my molds were a different size.
All that said, I’m doing the chicken version in my 3qt dutch oven instead of my 5qt saute and it is going much better. Taking just as long to reduce the normal, non-doubled amount, but going well. I think I let the heat go on my first batch and it split on me. Fortunately it looks like it didn’t matter in the end.
I think you've just reduced it too much, I'd rely on looks and feel rather than time as the wattage and power of your hob or the width of your pan will greatly change how fast the stock reduces, the wider the pan, the faster it'll reduce as there is more surface area for the steam to escape. This is why they recommend changing to a smaller pot later on in the reducing process so you can better adjust and manipulate your reducing stock.. That explains why it got thick and you got less yield. There's no added sugar in this recipe so it's more likely its just scorched rather than caramelized.
Well I mean, this came out perfectly apparently. And I misjudged my mold so I got exactly 16 cubes at 35g. Who knew.
Took 35g and stirred it into 2 cups of boiling/simmering water. Took over 5 minutes to dissolve and even then there was a little at the bottom of the pot when I poured it into the bowl. The 35 grams reacted like taffy when I pulled it. Very weird. Feels like I make something against God or nature hahahaMilky looking stock.
Maybe I shouldn’t double a recipe the first time I do it? Lol
Well things were going smoothly until the last half hour of reducing. It separated and I got a really thick and sticky caramel like texture. I did a double batch and ended up with basically a normal yield. Wtf. (Pictures not posting?)
Almost done reducing. Looks like it’s split with the fat on top? When I pour it into my glass purex to pour into the molds I’ll first take an immersion blender to it?
