DIY Homemade Dog Food
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Keep your dog healthy and fit with this easy peasy homemade recipe – it’s cheaper than store-bought and chockfull of fresh veggies!
I never thought I would be one of those dog owners who made homemade human food for their pups. Not in a million years.
But when Butters recently fell sick with an upset stomach, our vet advised us to feed him a bland diet – chicken and rice without any kind of seasoning. So that’s what we did – we poached a chicken, shredded it in a food processor, and mixed in some white rice and fed him this bland diet for 3 days.
That’s when I started to do some research on homemade dog food, and I have been so amazed as to how many different kinds of vegetables dogs can have. And with the help of Balance IT, you can create so many different recipes for your pup!
Now the best part about making homemade dog food – just like making anything at home – is that you know exactly what is going into the dog bowl, and not any of that questionable gelatinous gunk from the canned food.
But it’s important to note that dogs have different nutrient requirements than humans for their proportional body size, such as:
- High-quality protein (meat, seafood, dairy or eggs)
- Fat (meat or oil)
- Carbohydrates (grains or vegetables)
- Calcium (dairy)
- Essential fatty acids (egg yolks or oatmeal)
Now this recipe here has a balance of 50% protein, 25% veggies and 25% grains, but the ratios can easily be adjusted to suit your pup’s breed and/or needs.
Once you’ve made your batch, you can divide them up into single servings, note the date, and freeze it. When ready to serve, you can defrost it in the fridge overnight and nuke it for 15-30 seconds. That’s it! Now who knew that making dog food would be this easy?
DIY Homemade Dog Food
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups brown rice
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 3 pounds ground turkey
- 3 cups baby spinach, chopped
- 2 carrots, shredded
- 1 zucchini, shredded
- ½ cup peas, canned or frozen
Equipment
Instructions
- In a large saucepan of 3 cups water, cook rice according to package instructions; set aside.
- Heat olive oil in a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add ground turkey and cook until browned, about 3-5 minutes, making sure to crumble the turkey as it cooks.
- Stir in spinach, carrots, zucchini, peas and brown rice until the spinach has wilted and the mixture is heated through, about 3-5 minutes.
- Let cool completely.
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Thank you for sharing this recipe, it is amazing! I had my dog Josh try it out and he sends his compliments too 🙂
The entire bowl was done in less than five minutes.
I would like to add that depending on your dog liking, you could add mashed tunafish. My dog loves tuna in everything
is everybody using the 80% lean or the 93% lean turkey?
My senior corgi mix is diabetic for 4 yrs. I am cooking his food, chicken & gr beef, but want 2 add vegs. I consult his vet. It is very difficult to find any recipes for diabetic dogs, even for treats. Does anyone have a good recipe ? Thank you for your recipes, it is soo important to feed a proper diet to our pets. I am constantly looking at ingredients in dog treats. There is always some form of sugar, molasses, cane sugar, etc. Please watch , this will effect your dog later on.
I cook chicken thighs in the oven with my dutch oven. Add water and shredded carrots and cook at 250 degrees until done. Once cooked I shred all the chicken and set aside. Then in the left over stock (water from cooking chicken) I add frozen spinach (fresh would work too) and frozen peas. The warm broth will defrost the vegetables. Then I add cooked rice from the rice cooker. Add chicken back in. I make very large batches at once so I freeze some of it in glass topperware. The homemade food is our dogs topper. They still get an organic kibble with homemade stuff. It’s about 60 percent kibble and 40percent homemade wet food.
Can someone please mention how much am I supposed to be feeding my dog? Thank you!
2% of body weight ..
100 lb dog 2 lbs of food.
75% meat 5 to 10 % kidney
10% veggies and fruits
5%sardines or muscles .. fish oil can also be used
10% bone . . I give raw chicken feet.. Or you can use egg shells which have calcium as well.
Dogs need calcium so dont forget fish and calcium are important..
Hi, would like to give you recipe a try. Howeve, I’m from India where it’s difficult to procure Turkey, can chicken be used instead?
Thanks
Yes.
Hello I had to read your comments on homemade dog food.
I have A6 year old long haired dachshund she weighs about 15 pounds she had liver failure about six months ago and the vet wanted her to go on a $4.25 dog food I thought that that was ridiculous not only that she didn’t like it so I started making my own I do use brown rice and I think that animals are forgiving for what you give them 25% 40% I don’t think it makes that big of a difference.
I have thought about something that came to mind after I had found a premium dog food dry dog food that had all the great nutrients in it with no copper which she can’t have. I think I am going to put two cups which is 16 ounces of this dry dog food with chicken butt chicken juice to moisten it and then put it in the boneless skinless chicken that I have cooked.
I have often thought about the vitamin minerals that she wasn’t going to get from the homemade dog food and I am really excited about trying this dog food with the chicken. What say you?
I have a 10 year old dog with major allergies and a 12 year old dog that I think now has kidney failure (from what Dr. Google tells me, hehe). what i have read is that a homemade diet is best for kidney failure for lower salt content, protein content, etc. Going to try it I think. not to mention they loooove people food. I just bought Taste of the Wild 30 pound bag for $46 at PSP for 4 dogs. we go thru about a bag a month.
I was feeding dog chow from Sams 50 pounds for $26, but hubby felt our border collies fur wasn’t shining so decided to buy the expensive stuff. Thanks for the info. can’t wait to start cooking for my fur babies.
I have been experimenting, not a nice word, with my dog food. This is what I do. I would appreciate any advice you could give me. even if I am wrong, I need to know it. I have a Shih Tzu (1 1/2) and a Pomchi (7)
I cook a 10 pound bag of chicken legs and thighs and remove the meat and gristle.
I hand grind the meat and gristle, putting into a BOG bowl
I add 5 eggs, 1/4 cup of pulverized dried egg shells (for calcium) 5 medium tomatoes chopped, 3/4 cup minute rice (brown is better but all I had was white)
1/2 large bag of mixed veggies and enough chicken broth to make it moist enough to swell and cook the rice.
Then I spray an 11″ x 14″ corning pan and spread it out evenly. If it seems too thick, I make an additional 8″X 8″ pan.
I bake on 325 until a knife comes out clean…. (close to 1 hour)
When it is cool, I cut into 3 inch squares and they have one in the early morning and one in the evening.
Are there any spices that I can add that are beneficial to their health.
Also, the Shih Tzu eats 2 small salads a week. (no dressing or onions)
All I do is say “CHICKY-CHICKY” and they run to their bowls.
Just made this for my frenchie! I was mixing wet/dry food with water and heating it up. She just started vomiting it up these past few days and I knew I had to change her diet. She loved this! I didn’t even have to sit with her to get her to eat 😛 Thank you!
Hi ,is it safe to make a couple of days worth of Turkey white rice and vegetables to keep refrigerated and then feed at room temperature.
Methods for optimal food storage and shelf life should be based on good judgment and what you are personally comfortable with.
CAN I USE CHICKEN MINCE AS A REPLACEMENT? I AM IN CT SOUTH AFRICA AND AM UNABLE TO FIND TURKEY MINCE
Yes.
One thing to think about is when cooking your dogs food is that your cooking all the nutrients out of the food that your dog needs. Alot of people feed a raw diet.
Great recipe, but I think you forgot to include the amount of balanceIT supplements that you need to add to the mix?
I actually did not include it in the recipe as the amounts can vary depending on the size of your pup.
Hi, do you cook the vegetables before adding them to the mix?
There’s no need to! 🙂
It makes sense for humans of course to eat the brown vs white rice, but remember this is food for dogs, and the white rice is better as far as getting any nutrients due to their short digestive tract. And also since talking about absorbing nutrients, the vegetables in this recipe have not been cooked enough to release the nutrients. If you are determined to feed vegetables they need to be “predigested” so to speak. Cook and pulverize them to simulate them going through the digestive tract of a herbivore. Then add them to the homemade dog food. The comment that cooking them too much will destroy the nutrients, doesn’t make much sense, because if you don’t they simply go through as roughage.
I agree. White rice is more digestible and my dog has pancreatitis so i also over boil the vegetables and mash them up so its easily digestible otherwise he has problems. .
Does anyone have good recipes including venison?
Did I miss something? All that turkey and all that rice plus the veggies and it only makes 1 cup? That’s hard to believe but that’s what it said: 1 serving 1 cup.
The recipe yields about 8 cups.
I am in agreement with Gladys. This reads like a great recipe to try, however I am trying to figure out the economical value in it based on the numbers provided. This recipe/suggestion is for a very small breed dog, yeah?
Three pounds of turkey will cost, roughly, some $15-$20, tack on another $10 for the rest and you have a $25-$30 budget for a little over one week’s worth of food for a medium sized dog (30+ lbs at 1.5-2 cups daily). That’s about $75-$90 a month versus $50-$75 store bought.
Since our Yorkie has such a sensitive stomach, I am going to try making his food for him instead of buying the canned food in stores. I came across this recipe and it looks perfect. Since this will make quite a bit, do you freeze it in ziploc bags, and pull out as needed?
Yes, absolutely. We do that all the time!
Thanks for another new recipe…my fur baby will appreciate it. She is 16 and very picky. She won’t eat the same thing two days in a row and picks out visible veggies so I have to blend them in.
I do worry that she doesn’t get enough calcium although she loves a fruit and milk smoothie and bits of cheese as a treat, I still wonder if that is enough.
Pardon me if this is a dumb question. In the recipe, you say “1.5c of brown rice.” In the instructions it says to cook according to the package. If I calculated correctly, ( 1 cup raw rice will yield 3 cups cooked) Should it be 4.5c of cooked rice or is it 1.5c cooked rice?
I had a insulin diabetic rescue, that I made ( raw) food for and it resolved a lot of issues for him. Our new little guy has a delicate stomach. This is the only thing that hasn’t “bothered” his stomach.
Not a dumb question at all! The recipe calls for 1 1/2 cups uncooked brown rice.