Beets & Bones brings hearty bone broth and cold-pressed organic juice to Cottleville

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Courtesy Beets & Bones

The service area at Beets & Bones is shared with Upshot Coffee. Above the counter are signed and numbered prints by Shepard Fairey from the "Obey Giant" series.

Courtesy Beets & Bones

As the mercury plummets, a trend that's taken off in other cities is coming to St. Louis—and we're not just talking holiday pop-ups.

The concept: broth bars, a hot topic at times.

Already, Bolyard's Meat & Provisions has quietly been offering clear, flavored broths (pork, beef, and chicken) for the past five years. 

Now, Nick Zotos and Conor VanBuskirk of Upshot Coffee in Cottleville are rolling out a new health-centered concept that centers around bone broth and cold-pressed juice, Beets & Bones.  

"Nick came to me with this idea to add cold-pressed juice and bone broth," recalls VanBuskirk, who opened the coffee shop in the former VB Chocolate Bar space earlier this year. He quickly became friends with Zotos, a former chef who was a regular in the mornings. "At that time, I was looking to add something that was healthier and more quick-serve, something that wasn't really being done around here. So I took him up on it, we formed a partnership, and launched Beets & Bones.”

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Courtesy Beets & Bones

Bone broth plus add ins, including miso carrot caramel, mint chimichurri, chile oil, and sunshine dust with lemon

Aside from broth's obvious warming properties, well-made bone broth delivers fast-absorbing vitamins, minerals, gelatin, and collagen while hydrating the body. Bone broth adherents claim that it’s good for the joints and digestive system, and it tastes like a satisfying meal rather than a cloying dessert.

“Drinking broth has kind of been ingrained in my mind,” says Zotos. “Working in kitchens you’re always making chicken stock, veal stock, fish fumet. You always have that stuff going. But it also kind of goes back to my childhood; I'm Greek, and my dad was always simmering bones from when he would bring home roasted lamb carcasses. Who doesn't love the aroma of stock when you walk into a kitchen?"

Courtesy Beets & Bones

Broth with a meatball

The partners recently began wholesale distribution with Double Star Farms and hope to sell frozen bone broth at local supermarkets. “The bone broth can be frozen indefinitely and holds up great,” Zotos says. “The juice is a little bit trickier. We don’t pasteurize anything, so it has about a three-day shelf life. Everything is hydraulic cold-pressed and bottled immediately, so we don’t ruin any of the enzymes.”

Zotos and VanBuskirk are moving quickly to expand their product line. “We’ve started doing broth add-ins,” Zotos says. “I save some of the carrot juice, and I do a miso carrot caramel. I do a mint togarashi in a chimichurri style. We just started a meatball, and we'll have candied shiitake mushrooms soon. The miso carrot caramel is the house favorite.”

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Courtesy Beets & Bones

Veggie bowl prep at Beets & Bones

Courtesy Beets & Bones

Avocado toast, with cherry tomatoes, feta, and micro fennel

The list of healthy dishes is also growing. “We're definitely expanding the food line,” says VanBuskirk. “If you want to come into the shop and grab a caramel latte and biscuits and gravy, that's great. But, also, if you want to come in and grab an organic cold-pressed juice, bone broth, and a completely vegan bowl and take it with you on the road, we have those options for you.”

Their goal is to eventually open Beets & Bones cafés and give the brand its own run.

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Courtesy Beets & Bones

Three recent juice blends include Sorta Sweet Green (dandelion, kale, spinach, pineapple, green apple, red Apple, mint, ginger, lime, parsley), Bleu Apple Pie (blueberry, green apple, acai, celery, ginger, lemon, allspice, e3 algae), and Mount Rose Apple (handpicked Oregon Mt. Rose apples, rosewater, lemon, probiotics).