Cool! How long does it keep in the fridge?

The recipe fills 2 Nancy’s Yogurt 2 qt containers, and the boys go through that much food in about 8 days. I used to freeze one, but I’d always forget to thaw it in time, so now they both go in the refrigerator. Doesn’t seem to go bad over the week.

I have been making dog food (as a result of the recall), too. I created three recipes and have been alternating. One is 2 parts cooked chicken, 4 parts brown rice, and 1 part green peas. I cook the rice and the process it all slightly in the food processor, along with an egg. I then bake it like a meat loaf. The other two combinations are tuna, whole wheat pasta, mixed veggies--held together with a little cream cheese and egg (also baked). Or, oatmeal, egg and a little bit of bacon for flavor (cooked on the stove top). I have read that vegetables and whole grains are good, that onions are iffy and garlic is excellent. I think the only things to stay away from are grapes, raisins and chocolate.

Great recipe ideas. I started making my own dog food last year but gave up when I had to go out of town for a couple of weeks. I found our dogs became more impatient too! They wanted their bowls, NOW!

hmm. we should try this on crickey!

In point of fact, Menu Foods is a Canadian company, but the food was manufactured in the United States.

I lost my cat to the tainted food, and if I ever get another, it’ll only get a homemade raw diet.

Posting this a little late, hope you still check back on this article. Obviously, the pugs are doing great with their dental hygiene on this diet, but do you have to take extra care with their teeth and gums since this is mostly a wet food diet? Thanks, Beri

Beri,

We give the boys greenies and other teeth-cleaning treats, but they still need an occasional trip to the vet for their teeth. It’s difficult to get back to their molars to clean them, and they really hate it.

Jim

What quantity do you give them of the chicken,rice,carrot mixture a day?
I have been boiling chicken and mixing some wholewheat bread with it to bulk it up a little. Will add carrots next time

We feed a half cup in the morning, the same in the evening.

Jim

I do the same, but once every week and a half. I cook a whole bag of rice in a large pot, Boil a bag of chicken breasts with no bones, and boil 3 large bags of chopped carrots. I let them cool and then combine the whole lot with concreted chicken broth made from bullion cubes. Lastly I use my vacuum sealer, and individually seal around 25 bags to keep in the back of our freezer. This allows us to microwave our dog’s food on the go lasting a week and a half. I takes an hour to prepare and seal, but in the end; It’s nice to have quality food for our dog on hand.

Help. I’ve been doing all of this for 2 years now and someone just told me to research dog’s digestive system. They said I will see that they can’t break down the grains (like the rice I cook). sure enough, I do notice that all the rice comes out whole in my dog’s stool. Is he getting the nutitional value of the rice?

oats or millet are better substitutes. Stay away from, corn, wheat, soy.

I would love to do this but my boys go through about a dozen cups of kibble a day. That would mean restaurant sized production every few days and their own freezer. I love my Pyrs but I’m not gonna convert my kitchen to full time DF making. ;₍

Have been feeding my dog home-cooked for several years, and her teeth are great - the plaque from the kibbles is no more, and her coat and health are good. She has dropped weight to a nice amount. 3 cups a day of equal parts of:cooked brown rice, cooked meat and mixed veggies; with added kelp and vitamins. She is 70 lbs. A bit of a chore, but worth it (to me). The Great Pyrs would be tough!

We have a pomeranian mix who has been on medicine for siezures for 8 years, she is now 10.the vet gave me this recipe for her.(sometimes preservatives can cause siezures the vet says.) She seems healthy, and very active with regular check-ups and teeth cleaning.2 cups white rice 4 cups water. cook as directed. lightly brown 1/4th pound hamburger.2 slices white bread crumbled, and 2 boiled eggs chopped. mix all together.I freeze this in portions.He recomended fresh carrots, unsalted green beens,fat free cottage cheese and vitamins.I have added lean chicken to her diet. she digests the rice and never has gas.she’s only 7 lbs.I got on this site to ask if brown rice is good for dogs.

In the nearly four years we’ve had our terrier mutt, we’ve always fed her homemade food and thankfully she’s the picture of health and, I think, the most energetic dog at the dog park. Usually a quick-seared ground beef hamburger, cut up and mixed with brown rice and a vegetable. Sometimes the protein is ground lamb, calves or beef liver, fish or an egg, or plain roast beef cold cuts. (Chicken and turkey give her diarrhea.) The meat we buy in one pound packages and divide up into about 6 portions and freeze, taking it out daily to thaw. The brown rice is usually leftover from our last Chinese takeout meal -- it seems to keep much better than what we cook ourselves. The vegetables we boil in batches to keep 3 or 4 days in the fridge. She also gets a doggie vitamin, and we add fish oil to some of her meals, which has helped her coat. It might sound complicated, but once you’re a little organized with the ingredients, the prep time for the meal itself is five minutes. Of-course it would be much more challenging with a big dog.

My yorkie age 6yrs. has allergies, was feeding him rabbit and potato,he was doing ok still scraching a little but, not as bad. This diet sounds great and my yorkie loves vegestables and fruits. My question about this diet is, does it make the stool loose ?

anon #16:

We’ve switched to brown rice because it provides more nutrients

anon #18

No loose stools from the pugs. And the carrots actually make the poop stand out in the yard so you’re less likely to step in it.

Jim

We have a Westie and a Cockapoo that scratch constantly. The Westie takes 3 different pills every other day for allergies. He constantly has hot spots. The doctor said to use Rabbit and Potato food - very expensive. Haven’t tried it yet. Your recipe sounds great, thanks for all the information. Do you have any recipes for doggie treats?
Sharon, Gordon, CAPT Nemo and Bella

Sharon & Gordon,

Sorry, but I don’t make any dog treats. We get bulk treats at our local market.

And I’m sorry to report that Marty, our older pug, died last fall. Carlo seems to have adapted to being the only dog in the house.

Jim

i have 3 boxers a german shephard dalmation and a little white dog how much do i have to make everyday to feed them.they go throght a 50lb bag of doog food a week.

Jim - I enjoyed your article very much. I recently started feeding our pug, Buddy, and his black lab gal pal, Matty, raw food along with kibble. I seriously can’t get it in the bowl fast enough! What I’ve noticed about both dogs is that their breath is 100% improved - and their teeth are really looking good. We didn’t start these dogs out with brushing their teeth and the lab might let us do this, but Buddy would pitch a tornado of a fit, so that’s not happening. Anyway, I buy a large bag of carrots, apples, peppers...zuchinni (Buddy loves zuchinni!)- all kinds of veggies. If I chop a container (it will keep a week in a lock-n-lock) of 6 carrots, 2 apples and 3 smallish zuchinni (not the monster size) and I squeeze a 1/2 a lemon on it to keep the apples from browning...then throw a good handful in their dishes each evening (they still eat kibble in the morning (and some at night)...although I was gone for 6 days and my friend who took care of them gave them the “salad” morning and night and now they just stare at me like I’m impaired when they don’t get morning “salad”). The reason I began doing this is because our vet said Buddy needed to lose weight. She said to feed him lettuce. He will eat spinach, but won’t touch lettuce and gets really excited about the “salad”...loves carrots. And they love ground turkey. I make a mixture of ground turkey, sweet potato and onion and they get ultra excited about that. Buddy will bark at me to hurry up! I found your comments when I was looking for protein requirements for Buddy. This is the reason I’ve been continuing with the kibble along with the “salad”. My husband thinks I’ve lost my mind making food for the dogs. I love it that they are so happy. I think even supplementing this way for our lab is really good for her. It’s hard to tell if her coat is more beautiful, since she’s black and during the summer she rolls in the dirt. I would love to find the thing that causes less shedding from mister Buddy, but I doubt that will happen.

Sorry to hear about the loss of your pug, Marty. They are such funny, sweet little dogs (although Buddy is 28 pounds and completely handsome)!

I’m now inspired to add the turkey burger as the protein source (I personally love the stuff and buy it all the time)...and will consider the rice too or maybe try a few other things and decrease the kibble until he doesn’t eat it at all. He eats a good brand, but how boring for our dogs...seriously. I believe Buddy looks much better too since I’ve been feeding him the “salad”. Once in a while I give them corn on the cob. Watching Buddy eat that is very funny and he loves loves loves it. It is a really easy thing for him to eat with his little front pug teeth!

Kim

There is a lot of confusion about a species appropriate diet for dogs.
The “why” is that we have crossed the line between science and prolific
industry propaganda. Since the 1950s vast sums of money have been
poured into shaping public perception because the profits are enormous.
Not to mention that “we the people” have a tendency towards
anthropomorphism, and convenience is a driving force.

For unbiased scientific information see the “Ol’ Shep’s Plight: Diet”
article at: http://achinook.squarespace.com/

There is also a “lighter” fabricated “Dr. P. Kibble Interview” :o)

My best to you and yours,
Lee C

The persistence of varied views seen here has more to do with the “quality” of research employed, and not recognizing the potential shortcomings of our mental facilities in arriving at “beliefs,” than it does on the extent of unbiased scientific support. For a better explanation see the article:
http://achinook.squarespace.com/journal/2008/10/11/mankinds-achilles-heel.html

My best to you and yours,
Lee C

The vet recently prescribed i/d food for our 12 year old Corgi. Which homemade recipes would approximate
or improved upon the benefits of commercially made
i/d food?

Making your own dog food is a good idea, however..I don’t see any mention of organ meat. Yes, I realize it’s rather gross, but according to the nutritionists and vets I have talked to, muscle tissue alone isn’t enough for a dog. They said to consider giving my dogs a vitamin supplement designed for dogs in addition to the human foods I was feeding. I’m with you on the nasty commercial stuff and hating to not know what’s in my dog’s food.

Dogs do not need grain. Do not. Need. Grain. They don’t. It’s convenient as a filler, but dogs cannot digest it. They get no nutritional value from it.
Dogs are omnivores, but you will not see wild dogs eating rice or wheat. That’s because it is not in their natural diet, nor are their bodies designed to ingest it.

I would just keep an eye on their weight and judge the amount of meat and vegetables I fed them accordingly. I have two large dogs and also had a shih tzu who did very well on a diet of chicken and vegetables mainly.

Where can you get the right amounts of each meal ingrediants to make these? I have a small dog, and really would like to make her food.
Caren

you may ask your vet for a recipe for food for your dog, this way it will be correct. I also buy a powder which I sprinkle on my dog’s food because she doesn’t have organ meat in her diet. i get it at a local pet store.

I have been making my (allergic to everything) Boston Terrier’s food for about three years. After many struggles with excessive licking, loose stools, etc. he is 10-years old and the picture of health.

My recipe is to throw three/four chicken breasts, an apple, two carrots, one cup brown rice, organ meat (usually chicken livers), and a couple potatoes into a pressure cooker. Half an hour later it is done, and I add a handful of quick-cook oats, one tin of sardines, and a pinch of flax seeds. I then use an immersion blender to quickly mix and divide into 1-cup tupperware. Most all of it goes into the freezer. This makes enough - at one cup, twice a day - for about two weeks.

It is inexpensive and besides the half hour or so spent putting it into the tupperware, not too labor intensive. My costs actually break down to less than the frou-frou organic, specialty, dog food alternative.

Do you add some water, a cup or two, to the pressure cooker? (or the safety plug will blast out! :O)

Dogs have a hard time digesting carbs and, specifically, grains. Also, carrots have too much sugar and dogs can be prone to diabetes. Dogs really only need what is in their natural diet: meat and fat. Olive oil is a good, healthy fat supplement....avocados as well. I just cook chicken thighs with olive oil in the oven and feed them off of it for the week....skin, fat and all. Dog’s digestive system is totally different from ours so it is hard for us to understand that a diet high in meat and fat is actually good for them!

I use brown rice, chicken livers, carrots and add garlic and flaxseed oil for my dogs. The vet said it was a great food for them. I always was concerned that maybe the chicken livers might be too much. Anyone know? I like the pressure cooker idea. I had been putting the whole thing in my rice cooker another words, cooking everything together.

@djoh: Using liver exclusively as the animal protein source might be too much (possible excess Vitamin A -- you should look that up). So I think you might want to consider varying it with a different, non-liver meat.

I started implementing a mixture of fresh foods (part cooked meat, rice or potato, veggies & broth) with my dogs kibble when she became pregant (an accidental double back). She recently gave birth to seven puppies and looks fantastic on this new diet! I expected her to be super thin, but by feeding her a nutritous diet, you can hardly tell that she is a mom of many!
I have read that kibble is important in the crunchy aspect, and being a penny pincher, I was not going to just throw mine out, hence the mixture I make them until we make a full conversion to homemade kibble. I have noticed some looser stools with her, but not with my other two dogs. That might be somehow related to her pregnancy?
But now instead of growling at my other dogs because she is so hungry, she is very content...except for the antsiness to get that food on the floor!! I can’t make it fast enough!
For me this is really not super time consuming. I usually cook enough meat for supper plus them for a few days. Always have potatoes, rice or veggies on hand...so super easy to reheat the meat and cooked potatoes or throw some carrots in my food processor and mix all in with some dry kibble, top with some gravy or broth. Nummmm! Never a kiblet left at this house!
Homemade dog treats/bones are fun as well. I got sick of paying $3.99/lb at Petco so started making my own. My dogs won’t even tough boughten dog treats anymore! Plus, they get to lick the beaters clean :)

I am needing an easy dog treat recipe for my Boston Terrier. I tried a liver recipe last week and she spit it out. We just moved overseas and Skooter is having horrible skin allergy problems. She was having it in the States before we moved overseas...which now I am realizing has probably been from her food. Most of the dogfood the vet here has fish oil in it and she refuses to eat it. She went three days without eating...would just sniff and walk away from the bowl. I really messed up and bought Puppy Chow which she scarfs down, but now the allergies have intensified. After doing so much research I know it is her diet and we are going to a home-made diet today! I just need to find an easy recipe for a treat.

Jim, or anyone else, my Pug has an allergy to milk bones (wheat) I am looking for something hard and cruchy to help keep his teeth clean. Any suggestions? Chewies are fine but he gets bored or them at times. Anyone have a recipe for crunchy treats? Also, when making the homemade food, rice and meat and carrots, how much do you feed them per day? Gus is a large male, 24 lbs.