Pretty common practice I think and NCHFP and Ball Blue Book both provide the instructions.

I know several others here have talked about it in the past and we do every chance we get. The broth comes in handy for all sorts of things - soup base being #1 in our house.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: Canning beef stock

You may want to also add some of the tougher meat for more flavor if the bones aren't meaty. You can also brown the bones for a fuller flavor.

Carol

Thanks. It may be a common practice elsewhere, but not here-- which is why I generally have lots of questions about canning in general (most folks here don't. I think I'm a trendsetter, LOL). I'm thinking soup base too, Dave, since my family is a bunch of soupheads. Carol, I've heard that browning the bones makes it taste great, but it,,, uh... stinks? I may try that when the kids go back to school anyway.

We can beef, chicken, and vegetable stock all the time. It really adds so much to anything from plain rice to any soups, stew, chilli, etc. Great stuff.

I can answer this one. We had a Holstein butchered last year. Asked for all the soup bones (mainly for dog treats). Found out that the long bones weren't tasty enough for human consummation, but the dogs liked them. The bones that they cut crosswise work best for taste.

My meat was frozen when picked up, so I didn't worked them up immediately. I would start the crockpot full of 'bones'and water, and after the meat fell off, I gave the bones to the dogs, leaving the meat (there is quite a bit) for us.

To can the broth, you have to get as much fat off of the broth as you can, then can according the NCHFP guidelines. To get some extra fat off, refrigerate the new broth overnight. Cooling it helps to bring the fat to top of container.

Enjoy the meat, it won't be anything like the grocery store. I am waiting to get another beef.

Marla

Holstein? Yours, or was someone else butchering an old milker?

Our neighbor has 3 really old cows (the heifer is more than 7 years old LOL!), I was wondering how they would taste. I think they're Herefords like my dad used to raise (I'll have to look next time I drive by), but we never ate the cows, just steers, and nothing that old.

She's kept them as pets, sentimental since her DH died, but just can't keep them any more. Didn't want to sell them for meat, but I don't think they're good for anything else (and maybe not even that) any more. "Grandma Cow" has got to be over 10 years old. So beef broth, don't even know about stew meat or ground meat at that age.

Locally at least, we call those hamburger cows...

There had always been Hereford and occasionally angus on DH's familys farm - except the years his mother kept milk cows. At some point nearing the end of their lifespan, those became 'hamburger cows'. Thatsa lotta meatballs, even for a family of 12.

And back to the broth, I've always roasted/browned the bones. Hot oven, doesn't take long, maybe 30-45 minutes, turning them if you have many and your pan is crowded.

But at over 7 yrs old, is the meat even GOOD hamburger? What about stew meat? Not sure it's even worth the price of butchering (or running the freezer) - unless it's good enough for stew or chili. We don't use a lot of ground meat.

Thanks Dave, that's about twice as old as any my dad ever butchered so I didn't know. Maybe I'll see how much she wants for the youngest one - but I have to get the new PC first.

Holstein is NOT the best beef cow, they don't add weight like the beef versions. Most of the cheap hamburger are from Dairy cows, not beef versions. The Holstein are gentle cows which work well with children, and tastes so much better than grocery meat.

Holstein's are cheaper as calves but take longer time to get to weight. We had Holsteins, Jerseys and Angus, whatever we could get as bottle calves at a decent price.

I actually don't even buy ground beef, except last year I tried grass-fed hamburger from BJ's. We prefer ground turkey, but really don't even use it much. We use the frozen pre-cooked turkey meatballs in our spaghetti. We eat a lot of pork and chicken, unless I find a good sale on roasts or a whole beef loin, then I cut up the beef myself and freeze it for roasts, chili, and stew. Usually look for grass-fed b/c grain-fed tastes weird to me after growing up on grass-fed (a little grain in winter to go with the hay) and venison. I have to say I really don't like venison much now - maybe ate too much of it as a kid, before my parents moved to 15 acres and got animals?

Grass fed doesn't mean beef versus dairy cows. After all, where are all the little bulls/steers going to go.

I know. I'm just saying I don't buy much beef in the grocery store. I really don't know what breed the grass-fed beef I do buy is - I don't tend to look for that info, don't get into the "certified Angus beef" hype.

I was just wondering why you had a Holstein butchered, if it was an old milker, or if it was a young steer. Most people don't raise Holsteins for beef, but I guess you're right, what are you going to to do with the excess males?

So was it grass-fed ;-)?

Ours were bottle babies and evidently steers.

They were fed grass, produce and leftover barley from making beer. Of course last year wasn't as good as year as previous with the drought. But "Bacon" tasted good and was very lean, some people who bought some of the others said they were too lean, if that can be.

We always named our steer Hamburger when I was growing up. Bacon sounds like a pig's name. My uncle used to raise pigs, he fed them any old produce or baked goods he could get. I distinctly remember one pig that tasted a lot like a glazed donut ;-)

This one was named 'Bacon' because he was going to bring home the bacon one way or another, He was the last one to leave, after having up to 15 at 1 time.

We had "sir'loin, big mac, hamburgerler, cheeseburgerler, london, broil, patty, bubbles (he blew bubbles with his bottle), and several others that I can't remember. It was 'fun' when they broke their electric fence and we had to chase them.

That reminded me, when my FIL was raising beef, ALL the bulls were named Joe. ALL the cows were named Rosie. I have no idea why, but I do have memories of him standing and calling in his broken English down into the field below the barn, Nuh Rosie, Nuh Rosie, and they all came, every last Rosie :)

Ajsmama, when he still drove, he would pull up behind a grocery store down the highway where they let him take the discarded produce for his pigs. And in winter, he made kind of a gruel of grain and vegetables for them over wood heat....reason was,' how would you like to eat cold food all the time when its freezing out'. Kind of an odd man really, he loved his sons and his animals, was a little crabby with the rest of us :) Gone many years now.

morz8 - did he have daughters, and a wife ;-)?

Ah, yes, I recall many times we'd receive a phone call in the middle of the night "Your animals are out". The cattle wouldn't go too far (but would be in the road), my horse(gelding) would stay put and the mares would usually just be in the front yard, but the stallion pony would be the one to break out, and let everyone else out in the process, so he could visit the neighbor's mares. He just wasn't interested in his mother or sister that I can ever remember. Maybe my dad locked him in the barn when they came in season. I don't know why they kept the stallion at all. Good thing the neighbors didn't have cows or we would have been in trouble when we had a bull!

He did have a wife, lost before him and an incredibly hard working woman - goes without saying with 10 children. I never saw them fight (raise their voices but not a real argument), or cuddle, but I'm sure that would have been private in either case. He had 4 daughters, all of us who were daughters in law, and 6 sons that he treasured ;)

I was just wondering if he treasured the daughters and wife as much as the sons you mentioned ;-) Sounds like an amazing family you married into, I can't say that my grandfather "treasured" his 5 sons, though he never got over losing the oldest to cancer when he was still in his 20's. And he definitely treasured his wife - he lingered for a couple of years after she died, but he didn't want to live without her.

Boy, did we go way OT!

To get really OT,

" I would start the crockpot full of 'bones'and water, and after the meat fell off, I gave the bones to the dogs..."

Please don't ever give cooked bones of any kind to a dog. My vet is $1800 richer after I made that mistake. Doesn't always cause a problem, but it did in my case and I'll never do that again.