Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Make your own dog food

I have posted before how you can rate your dog's pre-packaged dog food.  But lately I'm liking pre-packaged dog food less and less. Even the ones that are supposed to be so healthy have a lot of additives and things in there I don't like.   So I came up with a way to make my own dog food, something I know is healthy for them and that they will love to eat. 


If you're like me, you always have left overs that you end up throwing away.  We eat a lot of chicken in our house.  Like, at least 5 days a week we eat chicken.  Chicken is very affordable, and very healthy!


I usually make my own rotisserie chickens but today at the grocery store I was feeling lazy and decided to buy one.  I very rarely eat left overs, so what ever was left of the rotisserie chicken would have gone in the garbage.  So here's what I did instead.

I have a little $10 food processor I bought at Walmart a while ago.   I got it out, and take off the leftover pieces of chicken meat.  I do NOT include bones, skin or any fat pieces.  Pretty much just the white meat and a little dark meat.   I put the meat in my food processor and grind it up.










I grind it up real good, and then pour it into a sealed container:





Sometimes I add fresh veges to it, like ground up baby carrots, broccoli, anything my dogs like.  Then I put the container in the fridge.  When it's time for dinner, I give them this fresh, ground up food and also throw a little bit of their doggie kibble in the dish for crunch (it's good for their teeth) and they eat it up like crazy!  If I have gravy I'll store that separately and pour just a little in their dish for extra flavor.

Last night we had tacos.  My dogs would eat the entire pan of taco meat if I let them.  So what I did - was all the meat that was left over, I placed in a strainer and rinsed it off real good, to get as much of the spices off the meat as possible.  Then I placed the meat in the grinder with some baby carrots and got this:



Last week I made chicken soup with brown rice, and ground up some left over pieces of chicken and the rice for them.

I feel so much better feeding them something I know is good for them, food they love, and I don't have to worry about all those "mystery" ingredients they are consuming.  And the next time there is a dog food scare I won't have to worry if my dogs are in danger.

4 comments:

  1. That's awesome! meat, carrots, rice, and vegies are so good for doggies anyway, and getting that from homemade and real foods is even better! Chiqi LOVES carrots, so that hamburger/carrot mixture sure looks appetizing for her! LOL

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  2. How great...of course, that would mean I would have to make dinner for my kids as well! Thanks for stopping by!!

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  3. I routinely buy 97% fat free ground turkey, boil it with some spinach and a handful of bulk barley (not instant). Drain, portion out in freezer bags, get the air out. Freeze. Then defrost in frig and feed that over green beans to my dogs. I have 5 including one Doberman. They are in excellent health and love their meals. They get that for breakfast. Dinner is green beans with a little bit of Solid Gold kibble.

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  4. Feeding mostly meat with little or no bone is not a balanced diet.

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