Crockpot Pickled Pepper Beef Bone Broth Soup 

It’s September 22nd and I just have to wonder if I’m coming down with Covid or if it’s just allergies. This is my life and everyone’s life in an alpine pollen forest in the last sixteen months. I’m sneezing. Again. My eyes are swollen. Again. And now I’m dizzy? Why on earth am I dizzy? I need some bone broth soup and I need it immediately.

As someone who has resided under the two-hundred-year-old Jeffrey pines of the San Bernardino National Forest basically my entire life, I get sneezy, runny nose allergies almost every year. Usually, I take a Claritin, put some local honey in my coffee and calm down. Allergies are no reason to change my lifestyle or have a panic attack. Until Covid that is. Now every sneeze, every cough, every germ has me running for a thermometer and canceling plans left and right. I am fully vaccinated but I also go to the germ-filled grocery store. That is where I see unvaccinated children picking their noses, obviously without masks on then touching every apple I just thought of purchasing. And all those germy-germs have me wondering if I picked up the Delta variant while running errands or if I’m just constantly blowing my nose because I hiked fifteen miles through a timber forest and breathed in all that fresh pine-filled air. Do I have Covid or is it pinion-pine tree asphyxiation?

I have never, ever in my life been sick enough to want to drink broth when I’m sick. Ever. I can’t stand broth. I know that this thousand-year-old elixir is just fantastic for everything from its anti-inflammatory powers to being chock full of zinc and collagen. Even knowing how great it is for me I can’t stomach the thought of broth for lunch. It’s not the kind of soup I normally crave.

That is until I came up with this awesome pickled pepper beef bone broth soup. Man, this is a tasty soup and you can make a ton of it in advance. Yes, the beef chuck roast is an expensive cut of meat but a big chunk of chuck roast goes a long way. This beef bone broth soup freezes and defrosts chock full of flavor (And zinc!) This is the Covid-elixir you want to stock your freezer with just in case you come down with the C-word (Coronavirus)

Why beef bone broth?

It may sound gross but boiling the carcasses and connective bones of cows and chickens is so good for your healing body. They say it takes twenty-four hours to boil an authentic beef bone broth but those experts don’t have a pressure cooker! I pressure cook my beef bone broth for thirty very loud minutes. You can’t burn a bone broth. The point is to boil the hell out of all those bones and break down the cartilage. Yummy. Cartilage.

Bone broth is all the rage here in 2021. It started with the popularity of the paleo diet. Yes, cavemen started this trend back in the day with their need to use every part of the animal. It does make sense. When I make the plain bone broth I even give some to our animals. Everyone can use more calcium, iron and anti-inflammatory properties in their daily diet, even our pets!

So why add beef bone broth to your diet?

• Number one, you can waste less, curb your carbon footprint just a bit and put those leftover bones to good use. I freeze bones as I’m done with them from rotisserie chicken and short ribs and when I get a good gallon size ziplock bag I’ll pressure cook a whole pot of bone broth. I then save it for this delicious Pickled Pepper Bone Broth Soup or to add to some of my favorite curries like this Moroccan Lamb Stew.
• The anti-inflammatory properties found in bone broth help fight arthritis. The collagen helps fight joint pain.
• The gelatins that break down in the beef short rib bones I use for this beef bone broth are full of glucosamine, chondroitin sulfate and even amino acids.
• Adding collagen to your diet every day is great to help those tendons heal. Bone broth is just a great all-around “sports drink” for athletes or those who work out a lot. As much as bone broth is not my favorite, I still think it tastes better than Gatorade.
• Bone broth is full of magnesium which is way better and more natural to help your body relax than those big pharma muscle relaxers your doctor just prescribed. My chiropractor told me a lot of those prescribed muscle relaxers can lead to acid reflux. Stick with more natural bone broth.

How else can I make bone broth taste great?

• Thai beef bone broth is absolutely delicious. I create the regular bone broth. At the very end, I add in carrots, grated ginger, grated garlic and a pinch of fish sauce for ten minutes to the pressure cooker. Serv with torn-up kaffir lime leaves, sliced green onions and a squeeze of sriracha.

As much as I don’t care for bone broth I know it’s great for me and how much it would help me heal from my current degenerative disk disease if I would just have bone broth for lunch a few times a week. Thank God I came up with this delicious soup that also helps fight viral infections.

Pickled Pepper Beef Broth Soup in the Crockpot

3 cups homemade beef bone broth made from steak bones or beef short rib bones

2 teaspoons butter

1 cup water

1/2 a white onion, sliced

1 pound chuck roast

1 bottle peppercines

3 tablespoons mayonnaise

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon pepper

2 teaspoons dill

2 teaspoons paprika

1/3 cup apple cider vinegar

Douse the chuck roast in salt and pepper. Sear in a cast iron pan in the butter. Put the pre-made or store-bought beef bone broth in the crockpot. Mix the mayo, paprika, and dill. Put the whole chuck roast in the crockpot, smothering the top of it with the mayonnaise mixture. Pour the apple cider vinegar in the crockpot. Let cook at least one hour in the crockpot.

In the leftover butter pan, cook the onion slices for about ten minutes. Add the onion slices and all the butter juices to the crockpot, scraping out all the best bits with a spatula. Heat all this on high in the crockpot for at least four hours.

Remove the beef chuck roast from the beef bone broth soup and let sit ten minutes. Shred with a fork and return to the crockpot. Let the soup heat for thirty minutes. When you are ready to serve add the peppercines to your bowl to garnish. Serve with a sprinkle of parsley. This dish is also amazing with some Indian-style carrot pickle to spice things up.