Bouillon, broth, consommé and stock 

By JOE O'CONNELL, cbbqa Past President
On April 21, 2001

Updated by BILL WIGHT, cbbqa member
On December 10, 2002 

A member recently wanted to know if canned beef bouillon can be substituted in a recipe that called for beef stock.  This comes up often, and all cooks should know the differences between bouillon, broth, consommé and stock, whether they are homemade, canned, or in cubes.  Related terms include soup and aspic.  Surprisingly few people know the differences between these words, so let's review the terms, starting with the most basic and proceeding in logical order.  Note that these are the meanings for the real, homemade thing -- not the canned or bottled stuff (discussed below).  

Here are the definitions of terms I like to use:

Broth means the liquid resulting from cooking vegetables, meat or fish with other seasoning ingredients in water.

Stock is the liquid remaining when the broth is strained.  Brown stock is make by browning meat and/or bones before they're cooked in water.  Most soups begin with a stock of some kind, and many sauces are based on a reduced stock (i.e. reducing means boiling the stock down to concentrate the flavor).

Bouillon is the French word for stock.  Period.  Same thing, different word.  By the way, it's pronounced BOOL-yawn (rhymes exactly with Fool-Yawn). 

Consommé is another French word which means bouillon that has been clarified.  Consommé is pronounced KON-suh-may or kon-suh-MAY.  Bouillon (which of course is simply a strained broth) is clarified to remove all the minute particles, which cloud or float in the liquid, which becomes magically bright and beautiful and which imparts a subtle refinement in the flavor.  The process uses egg whites, which are beaten into the warm bouillon, brought to a simmer, and delicately strained.  Consommé may be served as a soup (see below) or used as a base in other recipes.  Double consommé means that the regular (or single) consommé has been reduced by half its volume to double the intensity of the flavor.  Adding just a little unflavored gelatin and perhaps some Port (or other spirits) makes a jellied consommé.

Aspic is the same as jellied consommé, except that more gelatin is added. 

Soup means any combination of meat, fish or vegetables, cooked in water or in any other liquid, and intended to be eaten.  It may be thin (like consommé), thick (like gumbo), smooth (like bisque), or chunky (like chowder or bouillabaisse).  Most soups are served hot, but some (like vichyssoise and fruit soups) are served cold.

Homemade, canned and cubes

The definitions above apply to the real, homemade products.  Unfortunately, commercial products with the same name may be little resemblance to the real thing.

Canned bouillon (usually beef) and canned broth (usually chicken or vegetable) are intended to be eaten like soup, so they are heavily salted.  The ingredient label should be studied to determine the amount of salt and other ingredients were added.  Canned bouillon and canned broth can be improved significantly and then substituted for the homemade version.  For example, to remove much of the excess salt from canned broth, simmer the broth with diced potatoes, and the discard the potatoes.  Canned consommé is usually too sweet and is not recommended as a substitute for real consommé. 

Bouillon cubes (beef, chicken, fish and vegetable) are even less satisfactory than their canned counterparts, but they may serve in an emergency.  Be careful, however, because they are usually too salty.

An excellent alternative to homemade beef stock is a product called "Better Than Bouillon", which is sold in an 8-oz. jar at Bristol Farms and other markets.

Counterpoint

Food, recipes and cooking are not an exact science like chemistry.  Experts in the field have a lot of differences in the terms used in cooking.

For instance, Alton Brown in his book, "I'm Just Here for the Food" defines a stock as:

"A stock is a liquid in which collagen from animal bones and connective tissue has been dissolved and converted into a protein matrix called gelatin. Broth and stock are not the same thing. A broth is essentially any liquid that's had food cooked in it, be it meat or vegetables. Bones are not required for a broth, but they are for a stock. Thus, there is no such thing as vegetable stock." (p. 200)

CBBQA Member Tom Chilton says:

"Stock can be reduced to demi-glacè, which is used in classical French
cooking to make sauces. If you reduce broth, you just get concentrated and
nasty tasting broth. The use of stock and demi-glacè to make sauces, and
the systemization of sauces into 5 mother sauces and many derivative sauces was one important thing that set French cuisine apart from other cuisines."