Good Day All, I am looking for some new dog treat recipes. I am not a fan of being packaged "Treats" for the pet store. Even though some say all-natural, they is still a list of 20 something ingredients. My favorite are: 1- Slice Sweet Potatoes - Dehydrated in the oven 2 - Yoghurt & Peanut Butter cups (frozen) Looking for some new ones Thanks All,
The dehydrated sweet potato is a great idea. We sometimes make dog biscuits at home. Basically we get a bunch of salami offcuts (not too much chilli) from our local deli, put them in the blender, add water to cover and blend into a salami purée. Then we add plain flour (can use wholemeal), tomato paste, maybe some grated cheese (can add anything really!) and then mix it all up - you're looking for the consistency of firm biscuit/cookie/pastry dough. You can make the biscuits into any shape but we roll it into long thin sausage shapes and then cut this up into little bits (like you'd cut up a sausage) and bake at 180 degrees C till brownish and fairly dried out. You might need to turn the oven down and leave them in for longer to get them dry and kinda hard, as they will last longer this way. For North Americans I don't mean biscuits as in scones (or 'baking powder biscuits' or whatever you call them) but biscuits as in cookies (ie proper biscuits! ).
I cook pig liver in the oven, cut it into tiny cubes and freeze it; then I can grab a handful when I need it. They don't care if it's frozen or thawed out. I also make tuna or sardine cookies, by mixing the tinned fish with its oil into cooked rice with some minced garlic, binding it together with flour, rolling it out, cutting it into small squares and baking until cooked through. Again, I then freeze these and grab a handful on the way out the door. The dogs love both of these. Um, also I roast a whole chicken, then cut the flesh, skin, cartilage into small pieces and freeze. This is their absolute favourite. I let this defrost before use because it has far higher value that way.
I've taken to making a batch of liver cake every fortnight (liver, eggs and flour) and freezing it in tiny cubes. Molly loves it and it's a lot cheaper than shop-bought treats.
I do the dehydrated sweet potato too, so easy. I also make kangaroo (the only meat protein my dog is allowed) jerky mixed with sweet potato or banana or both. I never knew jerky was so easy to make till I started this. Before we had dietary restrictions I would buy a cheap roast of beef or pork on sale, cook, (we'd eat a bit ourselves) cool, cut into 1/4 inch cubes, freeze till needed.
The thing that I find so upsetting is how much it shrinks - you start off with a massive piece of meat, and it's a teeny tiny little sliver by the end of the dehydrating process! I hope kangaroo meat is cheap where you are!
No it isn't cheap. Canada is a long way from Australia. Mine doesn't shrink much but I use ground and I mix it with the sweet potato, mostly, which maybe keeps it from shrinking? Are you using whole meat? Ground is cheaper for me to buy than a roast. LOL, from talking to the young fellow at the butcher shop I get the impression most of the people who buy the ground kangaroo are ladies getting it for their dog. P.S. first I bake or nuke the sweet potato. Then I mix the cooked SP with the ground meat.