Beef Stock (Better Than Store-Bought)

We love this homemade beef stock recipe! Are you tired of bland, salty, store-bought beef stock? Try our Instant Pot recipe for homemade stock full of rich flavor. It takes just over 4 hours to make, cutting traditional cooking times in half.

If you’ve ever been disappointed by store-bought beef stock that lacks flavor and is overly salty, you’re not alone. I’ve had the same experience. But don’t despair!

Our Instant Pot beef stock is the solution. It produces a homemade stock with a deep, beefy flavor and luxurious texture, surpassing anything you can find at the store. Traditional stovetop methods for making beef stock can take over 8 hours, but our pressure cooker stock takes just 4 hours.

Using a pressure cooker speeds up the cooking process significantly. Our recipe’s 4-hour cooking time is equivalent to 16 hours using traditional methods! The result is a delicious beef bone broth rich in collagen and minerals. Currently, our favorite way to enjoy this stock is by making this French onion soup!

More homemade stocks: simple chicken broth, homemade chicken stock, and amazing veggie broth

Homemade Beef Stock Recipe Ingredients

Here’s what you’ll need to make this beef bone broth (or beef stock):

• Beef bones – You need good-quality, meaty beef bones for the best beef stock. I look to my local butcher shop and use whatever they have that day. Beef knuckles, oxtail, neck bones, shanks, and ribs are all great options, especially if they have a bit of meat left on them. Bones with bits of connective tissue helps with gelatin production (or the texture of the broth) and bones with meat helps with flavor.
• Tomato paste – We are all about that rich, beefy flavor. Thanks to the umami in tomatoes, tomato paste helps us achieve it. We roast our beef bones, rubbed in tomato paste, for 30 minutes before making the stock.
• Onion, garlic, and olive oil – Since we want our broth to be rich and beefy, we don’t use carrots or celery in this recipe. It also keeps our ingredient list down. The olive oil is for roasting the onions and garlic, sweetening them before making our stock.
• Fresh thyme, bay leaves, peppercorns, and salt – We keep our seasonings classic for this homemade stock.
• Pickapepper or Worcestershire sauce – We use Pickapepper in our homemade BBQ sauce and love it. The two sauces bump up the umami-rich flavor of our stock, so use what you have. Pickapepper is a little thinner and a bit sweeter than the more savory Worcestershire, but in this recipe, they are interchangeable.
• Water

Find the full recipe with measurements below.

How to Make Beef Stock

Since we use a pressure cooker for this beef stock recipe, the method is straightforward and requires much less time than stock made on the stove.

First, we need to roast our beef bones. Roasting makes our bone broth richer and more flavorful. Tumble the bones into a baking dish, then roast for 10 minutes. Remove the bones from the oven, and when they are cool enough to handle, rub them down with tomato paste, adding even more of a rich flavor. Toss in onions and garlic, and drizzle with olive oil. Roast everything for another 30 minutes.

Now transfer everything from the roasting pan to your pressure cooker (ours is an Instant Pot). Pour a little of your measured water into the roasting pan and deglaze it by scraping all the stuck bits from the bottom and sides. Pour this liquid into the pressure cooker along with the remaining measured water. Finally, add thyme, peppercorns, bay leaves, salt, and Pickapepper sauce (or use Worcestershire).

Seal the lid and cook on high pressure (or the stock setting) for four hours. Allow the pressure cooker to naturally release the pressure, and then strain.

Storing Homemade Stock

After making the stock, let it cool and refrigerate for up to five days or freeze for up to three months. When refrigerating the stock, leave the layer of fat that rises to the top as it cools. This layer of fat helps to keep the stock fresh. When you reheat, keep as much of this fat as you like. You can also cook with it.

To freeze stock, store it in freezer-safe bags or freezer-safe canning jars. If you use jars, make sure that you leave space (at least 1 inch) at the top to allow for expansion when the liquid freezes. You can also freeze stock in large ice cube trays. When they are frozen, transfer the stock cubes to a freezer-safe bag.

Recipes to Make with Beef Stock

The most fun part of making beef stock? All the wonderful dishes you can make with it! I’ve included our favorites below:

• Make French onion soup! It’s lovely with chicken stock and even more rich and satisfying with homemade beef stock.
• Use it to make pot roast! We use the Instant Pot to make the cooking time quicker than traditional stovetop or baked methods.
• I love these Swedish meatballs and use beef stock to make the creamy gravy served with them.
• Speaking of gravy, use this stock in our popular gravy recipe for a rich beef gravy.
• For a hearty stew, try our Guinness beef stew.