How to Prepare a Dark Roast Stock?

A dark roast stock is prepared on the basis of pork, beef, or veal bones. If you roast the bones together with vegetables and spices, the caramelized sugars contained in the bones and vegetables create spicy roasted substances. They can be removed by pouring water or a light broth and simmering for a long time. This stock is the basis from which a wide variety of dark sauces or soups can be prepared. The stock can also be used as a supplement if not enough gravy escapes when preparing hearty meat dishes.

You should plan several hours to prepare a roast stock and you need about 2 kilos of meaty, mixed bones from pork, beef, or veal. It is best to order these from the butcher in advance and have them chopped into pieces there. There are also onions, carrots, garlic cloves, pepper, salt, and bay leaves for seasoning, as well as tomato paste, a liter of red wine, and three liters of water. Roughly chopped vegetables such as celery and carrots add extra flavor to the stock.

First, the pieces of bone are roasted in a roasting pan with heat-resistant oil over medium heat until they have a nice dark golden color. This can take up to 1 hour. If you use large bones to prepare the roast stock, it is also possible to roast them in one piece in the oven without a roasting pan.

Then add the roughly diced onions and carrots and let them roast until golden. Then add the tomato paste to the bones and roast it briefly before the mixture is deglazed with red wine. The wine should be allowed to reduce several times before adding the water and boiling. Then add the spices to the stock and let the mixture simmer with the lid on at reduced heat, ideally for several hours. The stock stays clear if you regularly skim off the foam in between. If the cooking process has to be interrupted, you can also refrigerate the roasting stock and resume the cooking process the next day.

When the stock has finally reached the desired intensity of taste, it is left to simmer briefly without a lid and finally passed through a coarse sieve. For a particularly fine consistency, let the stock simmer again and pass it through a fine sieve – the finished roast stock can then be processed further or cooled and filled into jars for storage. The stock will keep for about three months in sterilized and well-closed jars when stored in the refrigerator.