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Instant Pot turkey bone broth is an ideal way to use up Thanksgiving or Christmas leftovers. Our flavorful golden version gels beautifully due to its high levels of collagen/gelatin, which is touted for all sorts of health and beauty benefits. Most importantly, it tastes incredibly good. Use it in soups and other recipes or for sipping. You can use this exact method with chicken bones, too!
Instant Pot turkey bone broth benefits
At the risk of being a little awkwardly enthusiastic, Instant Pot turkey bone broth is a dream come true for so many reasons.
First of all, it gives you a clear and present plan for what to do with that leftover turkey carcass after Thanksgiving or Christmas. I am good at cooking for crowds, and recipe development is a big part of my job. Even so, when I open up the fridge a few days after Thanksgiving and see a turkey carcass staring me in the face, it’s like, DUDE. Leave me ALONE. It’s empowering to know exactly what the plan is, and how easy it will be.
It’s SO easy, and relatively quick. As with all of our Instant Pot recipes, this is a set it and forget it situation.
It’s incredibly delicious and incredibly versatile. This bone broth is richly flavored and golden-hued. You can use it in soups, sip it by the mugful, or cook with it in any recipe that calls for chicken broth.
And then there’s all the hype about the possible health and beauty benefits of bone broth. Bone broth is high in amino acids. Our version gels, which means it’s packed with collagen/gelatin, which may support joint health, gut health, immunity, and skin elasticity.
So what is bone broth, anyway?
Good question, with a surprisingly simple and timeless answer. Bone broth is a trendy term for what the culinary world has traditionally called stock. Stock (or bone broth) differs from broth in that it is cooked for a very long time. Long cooking deepens flavors and draws more nutrients (including the much-hyped collagen) out of the bones and into the broth itself.
Bone broth is gelatinous at room temperature and liquid when heated.
The Instant Pot dramatically shortens the cooking time for bone broth while preserving all the benefits. We love to use the Instant Pot for this purpose. Instant Pot bone broth is when two trends make a right. It just makes so much sense.
How to make bone broth in the Instant Pot
To make bone broth, you’ll need:
- An organic (or other high-quality) turkey carcass
- Onion
- Carrots
- Celery
- Parsley (and other fresh herbs if you like)
- Bay leaves
- A little bit of apple cider vinegar
- Sea salt
- A few peppercorns
- Water
Here are the steps you’ll follow:
- Place all the ingredients into a 6- or 8-quart Instant Pot.
- Close the lid and set the vent to sealing.
- Cook at high pressure for 2 hours, with natural pressure release.
- Strain the broth, and it’s ready to use!
Instant Pot chicken bone broth
You can also make Instant Pot bone broth with chicken bones, which is what we tend to do during the rest of the year. Use the carcass from a whole roasted chicken, or about 2 1/2 to 3 pounds of bones.
You can get soup bones from your local butcher. Whole Foods often sells frozen chicken necks and backs for just over $1/pound, right next to the other frozen meat. These contain lots of connective tissue and are great for making bone broth.
If you’re not starting with the carcass from a roasted chicken, roast the bones as your first step.
Preheat the oven to 425°F with a rack in the center. Arrange bones in a heavy-duty roasting pan or on a lined, rimmed baking sheet. Roast for about 30 minutes, until bones have darkened in color a bit but not burned. Proceed with the recipe as written!
How to use Instant Pot bone broth
You can use bone broth as the liquid in almost any soup, including all of our top 20 soup recipes. You’ll especially appreciate its deep flavor and hefty character in brothy soups like stracciatella alla Romana, avgolemono soup, and minestrone.
Bone broth is also great for sipping straight out of a mug on cold days.
Or use it in place of chicken broth in any recipe, from risotto to brown butter white bean puree to braised chicken thighs.
Bone Broth FAQs
Q: Why is there vinegar in this recipe?
A: The acid in the vinegar helps to extract nutrients from the bones. You won’t taste it.
Q: Why does the recipe say organic turkey?
A: Really always, but especially when you’re purposely drawing out and concentrating the nutrients like we do with bone broth, it’s a very good idea to use the best-quality ingredients you can source. You can read all about good meat and where to get it in this post.
Q: Can you use beef bones for bone broth? Can you use pork bones?
A: Absolutely. But for the best-tasting bone broth made from beef or pork bones, you need to blanch them first. To blanch bones, place them in a pot and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil and then simmer briskly for 20 minutes. Discard the blanching water and proceed with the recipe, roasting bones as indicated in the recipe notes below.
Q: Can you freeze bone broth?
A: Sure can. I like to freeze it in ice cube trays or in reusable pint-sized takeout containers (usually from miso soup, because #sushi). Bone broth will keep well for six months to a year in the freezer.
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Instant Pot Turkey Bone Broth (Rich Turkey Stock)
Ingredients
- 1 organic turkey carcass, see note
- 1 medium yellow onion, halved, skin on
- 2 medium carrots, cut into 3 pieces each
- 2 ribs celery, halved
- 4 sprigs fresh parsley
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
- A few peppercorns
- Water
Instructions
- Place all ingredients into a 6- or 8-quart Instant Pot. Pour in filtered water, stopping about a half inch below the max fill line.
- Place lid on Instant Pot and set vent to sealing position.
- Set Instant Pot to manual (high pressure) for 120 minutes. (Protip: You can use the down arrow to make this faster since the minutes "wrap back around" to 120 after 0.)
- The pot will take a while to come up to pressure and then will begin counting down the cooking time.
- When the cooking time ends, let the pressure release naturally. This may take 30 minutes or so.
- Strain the broth through a fine-mesh sieve.
- Store broth in airtight containers (such as mason jars) in a cold fridge for up to a week. Or freeze (in ice cube trays, mason jars, or other reusable containers) for up to 6 months. After chilling, a small layer of fat should rise to the top. You can skim this off if you like, and either use it for cooking or discard it. Or you can stir it back into the broth.
Step-by-step video
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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You’re “DUDE- leave me alone!” comment is hysterical. I laughed hard. Thanks for the recipe, this is incredibly easy.
I’ve made this twice, both times were perfect, the first time I added ginger and green onions (left out bay leaves and parsley) to make an asian broth for soup, second time added jalapeno peppers and subbed cilantro for parsley to make broth for tortilla soup.
It’s perfect and a time saver, I can see making this in the summer too without heating up the kitchen. Thanks for this recipe Carolyn.
Woohoo! So glad, Jennifer. Thanks for the comment.
Can I use a Starfrit pressure cooker for this recipe
Hi Mitchielou, I’ve never used one, but you should be able to make this recipe in any pressure cooker that’s large enough to safely hold the ingredients.
I made this bone broth and used it for turkey soup and it was fabulous. Never made it before but the flavor was superb. Great way to utilize leftovers. Going to try with chicken bones. Thank you for this healthy recipe
This recipe calls for one celery stalk. Should it say one rib of celeey, or does it mean the complete stalk?
It’s two ribs. Thanks for the question — I’ll clarify in the recipe. After 13 years of never having gotten this question, it’s come up twice in a week! 🙂
You can also use lemon juice. (I’ve read of cooks using white wine too although I’ve not tried it). And, yes – the acidity of vinegar/lemon/wine helps pull the nutrients from the bones! SO good for a healthy gut!
Is the apple cider vinegar a necessity? What does it do for the broth?
Hi, Laura! The vinegar’s acidity helps to break down the collagen in the bones and make it (and its accompanying nutrients) more available in the broth. It’s a good idea to use it if you can. You’ll still make a delicious stock without it, and with the bones of a whole turkey the broth will very likely gel anyway. You could use a different mild-tasting vinegar instead if that’s what you have on hand. People usually use cider vinegar because the taste is mild and complementary enough to go unnoticed in the final stock.