Hydrolysed Bone Broth vs Dehydrated Bone Broth: What’s the Difference?
If you’ve been shopping for bone broth, you may have noticed something confusing. Some bone broth powders come in large 300–400g tubs or pouches, while Boil and Broth dehydrated bone broth comes in much smaller packs, typically between 35g and 120g.
So, are you getting less bone broth?
Not necessarily. The difference largely comes down to how the product has been processed and, importantly, how much water has been removed.
Hydrolysed bone broth and dehydrated bone broth may both originate from animal bones and connective tissues, but they are produced differently and the finished powders shouldn’t be compared simply by looking at the weight on the front of the packet.
What is dehydrated bone broth?
Boil and Broth’s dehydrated bone broth begins with making a traditional liquid bone broth.
Bones are slowly pressure cooked in water to extract naturally occurring proteins, collagen, amino acids and other soluble components from the bones and connective tissues. This creates the liquid broth that forms the starting point of Boil and Broth dehydrated products.
The broth is then carefully dehydrated over several days.
During dehydration, the water contained within the liquid broth is gradually removed, leaving behind a highly concentrated dry product. Once completely dehydrated, it can be ground into the bone broth powder you receive in your pouch.
This is why dehydrated bone broth can come in surprisingly small packages.
You are looking at the concentrated solids that remain after the majority of the water has been removed.
A small amount of dehydrated broth can therefore be reconstituted with hot water to make a much larger quantity of liquid broth.
For example, Boil and Broth larger 120g pouches can make 3 litres of prepared broth when reconstituted according to the directions.
What is hydrolysed bone broth?
Hydrolysed bone broth powder is made using a different process.
Hydrolysis uses water and, typically, enzymes to break proteins such as collagen down into smaller chains called peptides. This process is commonly used in the manufacture of protein powders, collagen peptides and hydrolysed bone broth powders.
Once hydrolysis has taken place, the liquid material is usually dried to create a powder, often using industrial drying methods such as spray drying.
The result is a convenient powdered ingredient containing hydrolysed proteins and peptides.
Neither process should be confused with simply grinding bones into a powder. Hydrolysis is a chemical way to extract nutrients from bones.
Why are hydrolysed bone broth bags so much bigger?
This is where comparing products purely by packet weight can become misleading.
Hydrolysed bone broth products are commonly sold in much larger quantities, often around 300–400g, whereas dehydrated bone broth may be sold in considerably smaller amounts, such as 35g, 50g or 120g.
That doesn't automatically mean the larger packet represents an equivalent product with substantially more servings or prepared broth.
With Boil and Broth dehydrated bone broth, we have taken a large quantity of liquid broth and removed the water from it. What remains is a concentrated, lightweight product.
Think about reducing a sauce in your kitchen. You might start with a large saucepan of liquid, but as the water evaporates, the volume and weight become much smaller while the remaining ingredients become increasingly concentrated.
Dehydration takes that principle much further, removing enough moisture to create a dry product.
This is why it is much more useful to look at serving size, ingredients, protein content and how much prepared broth the product makes, rather than comparing two products simply by the number of grams printed on the packaging.
Hydrolysed vs dehydrated: the key difference
The easiest way to understand the distinction is that hydrolysis and dehydration are doing different jobs.
Hydrolysis is a chemical process to extract nutrients from the bones and primarily changes the structure of proteins by breaking them into smaller peptides.
Dehydration is a natural process and primarily removes water.
Boil and Broth approach is centred around making a traditional liquid bone broth first and then removing the water to preserve it in a concentrated, convenient form.
When you want to use it, you simply add the dehydrated broth to hot or boiling water, allowing you to turn that concentrated powder back into a delicious liquid broth.
Why do we choose dehydration?
For us, dehydration allows us to keep the product closely connected to the traditional process of making bone broth.
We start with real bones, water and time. We cook the broth, remove the fat and then slowly remove the water from the finished liquid broth.
The result is a concentrated bone broth that is lightweight, easy to store and incredibly versatile.
It can look surprisingly small when you first pick up a 35g or 120g pouch, particularly if you are used to seeing large tubs of protein or hydrolysed collagen powders.
But packet size doesn't tell the whole story.
When comparing bone broth products, don't simply ask, “How big is the bag?”
Instead ask: How was it made? What are the ingredients? What is the recommended serving size? How much protein and collagen does a serving provide? And how much broth can I actually make from the pouch?
Those questions give you a much better understanding of what you are actually buying.
Boil and Broth dehydrated bone broth may come in a smaller pouch, but that's precisely the point: we've taken the liquid broth and removed the water, leaving you with the concentrated goodness of bone broth, ready for you to add the water back when you need it.
