What Home Cooked Food Is Good For Dogs

Fiber Filled For Fido

Get more fiber in your Shih Tzus diet with these healthy recipes that curb cravings and have heart-helping benefits. This recipe can help Fido maintain a healthy weight and improve digestive function.

Filled with vitamins and beneficial minerals. Adding too much fiber too quickly can promote intestinal gas, so only feed fiber-based food twice a week as they.

Ingredients

Source: WithaSplashofColor

Should You Feed A Homemade Diet

Homemade diets are growing in popularity in part because the ingredients can be controlled, so there is no fear of dog food recalls. In addition, many people are trying to eat healthier and they want the same for their dogs. Homemade diets are favored by some because they contain whole food ingredients that are generally considered healthier than processed dog food.

Home cooking dog food is not right for everyone. There are some factors to consider before you switch your dog to a homemade diet.

• Be sure to find a dog food recipe that is complete and balanced. One of the biggest mistakes you can make is to feed an incomplete or imbalanced diet to your dog.
• It takes time to measure ingredients and prepare the food correctly. Be sure you have a schedule that allows enough time to properly make your dog’s food on a regular basis.
• Make sure you can afford the ingredients to make your own dog food. Homemade food is typically less expensive than commercially prepared fresh or raw dog food, but it usually costs a little more than kibble.
• If you have a picky dog, you may need to source multiple recipes so you can change the diet periodically and keep your dog interested.

Blood Tests Don’t Lieand Hooch’s Numbers Shifted Drastically In Just The First 6 Weeks We Made These Diet And Lifestyle Changes

He noticeably had more energy, was suffering less from inflammation, was shedding less with a more luxurious coat, and for the first time EVER he had zero bloating! NO GAS for the first time in his entire life! The best news though, was that those stage 4 kidney disease blood levels he had at his yearly checkup had climbed back up to to midrange stage 1 kidney disease blood levels! The extra time and energy invested in making his food and the other small changes we made to his lifestyle have given us more quality time with our beloved Hooch which is more than we could have ever hoped for!

If youve made our Easy Homemade Dog Food for your pup I would be so grateful if you would rate the recipe and let me know what you think in the comments below! I just love hearing from you and your reviews and comments really help others that visit This Mess is Ours. Want to be a part of our online community outside of the blog? Its easy!! All you have to do is follow @THISMESSISOURS on , , , , or to see cooking demos, and peeks into our day to day life.

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What Are The Benefits Of Homemade Dog Food

Homemade dog food can benefit your canine companion in a number of ways especially if you have a pet who suffers from allergies, skin problems, or gastrointestinal sensitivity.

Highly-processed foods also tend to lose nutritional value, whereas making dog food from scratch maintains more of the vital nutrients during the cooking process. With fresh food, you know exactly what your dog is getting versus reading the label and being confused by all the included additives and preservatives.

Recommended Serving Size For Homemade Dog Food:

The amount of homemade dog food that your dog will require is dependent upon how much your dog weighs and how active he or she is. This amount varies from dog-to-dog. I suggest talking to your vet and getting their advice on a good starting point.

You can also monitor your dog to make sure they are maintaining their weight and staying happy and active.

This recipe makes about 6 cups of food, which is 3 days worth of food for Charlie who is about 45 pounds. You can easily adjust this amount based on the weight of your dog. Also, feel free to scale this recipe up and double or even triple it, if you wanted to cook less often.

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Dog Liver Disease Homemade Dog Food Recipes

The recipes below are what weve used for several of our own dogs when their liver enzymes werent too extreme and they werent diagnosed with copper storage or hepatic encephalopathy. You have to be very careful with this disease.

This means that having your dogs blood work done routinely including a complete liver profile is critical. If the liver enzymes remain stable, then you can continue with the diet but, you have no way of knowing this information unless you have the blood work done on a regular basis.

The following homemade recipes for liver disease in dogs are for a weeks worth of food and based upon our own dogs weight which was approximately 70-75 pounds at the time they were developed.

Also, youll notice that there are no veggies included in the recipe and this is because our lab at the time had IBS and veggies can often cause a soft stool problem.

Recommended products if your dog has liver disease:

Home Cooking For Dogs Allows You To Have Complete Control Over The Details

Many dogs are picky eaters. They dont like everything that you serve them. And as a matter of fact, they dont like precooked foods. Most dog foods available at the supermarket may not be the best for your dog. Some may have more salt. Others might have more proteins.

Some brands might add one particular ingredient in each of their packaged foods that your dog really hates. And you are tired of finding and searching for good dog foods.

Well, in that case, home cooking for dogs is just your thing. With home cooking, you can customize every meal your dog eats.

You can experiment with what your dog likes and what it doesnt. And this way, you can ensure that whatever you are putting on his plate, he will eat all of it.

So there would be no dog food waste anymore.

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What Can I Feed My Dog Instead Of Dog Food

Refrigerator

• Mild cheeses, such as American.
• Cooked white or sweet potatoes.
• Cooked eggs, such as scrambled eggs.
• Rotisserie chicken, skin and bones removed.
• Cooked lean meat, such as chicken, beef, or turkey.
• Cooked or raw fresh vegetables, such as carrots, corn, and broccoli.

More items19-Mar-2020

Best Shih Tzu Homemade Dog Food Recipes

Is you Shih Tzu a picky eater? This list of the best Shih Tzu food recipes will have your pup begging for homemade males.

As a bonus weve included a homemade yummy treat for because Shih Tzus also deserve some healthy treats from time to time!

Note: Please consult with your pets veterinarian and use personal judgment when applying this information to your dogs diet. The recipes below do not include serving size because portion sizes will vary depending on breed, weight, activity level, age, and the health of your dog. A common recommendation is to feed your dog a comparable amount of ounces/cups to what you would usually feed in kibble BUT check with your vet to be certain.

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You Have To Follow The Recipes Exactly

Once you have a nutritionally balanced recipe for your dog, you need to follow it preciselyfrom the ingredient types to measuring the ingredients to the cooking methods used.

Cooking methods matter because steaming versus roasting versus boiling can change the nutrient composition of a food, which contributes to a balanced diet.

Adding or substituting ingredients, like adding chicken on top, or substituting chicken for beef in a given recipe, unbalances the diet and poses a risk for providing too much or not enough of one or multiple nutrients.

Generating several balanced recipes, using a reliable professional source, will allow you to offer a wider variety of ingredients while still making sure that you meet your dogs specific nutritional needs.

Meat And Other Protein Sources

Protein sources should make up at least half of the diet, and preferably more.

Meat should include both muscle meat as well as organ meats . Because organ meats are nutrient-dense, it is best to feed small amounts daily or every other day, rather than large amounts at one time.

You can also include canned fish, such as pink salmon, sardines, jack mackerel, once or twice a week.

Dairy products such as yogurt and cottage cheese offer good nutritional value. These should be added after the food is cooked.

Eggs can be soft-boiled, hard-boiled, gently scrambled, etc.

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Feeding A Dog Is No More Difficult Than Feeding A Child

The first reason why you should consider home cooking for dogs is because it is really simple. It is no different from feeding a child.

You dont have to be precise with milligrams of calcium and vitamins, and carbs. You just have to use natural and fresh ingredients. And they have all the required nutrition in them.

You only have to make a list of foods that you are going to serve your dog. And this list of foods should be diverse.

You have to balance between meat, veggies, chicken, grains, or any other food item that your dog loves to eat.

Is Homemade Food Healthy For Puppies

Like humans, dogs have specific caloric requirements and need certain vitamins and minerals to stay healthy. Puppies have even more specific needs in order to grow at an appropriate rate and thrive. The food you feed your puppy must be complete and balanced. It must also be designed to support growth.

One of the biggest mistakes pet owners make when they decide to feed home-prepared diets is not following the right recipes . Preparing the right puppy diet is about more than just feeding enough calories. It must also have the proper balance of protein, fat, and calories for a growing puppy. The diet must also contain the right amounts of vitamins and minerals.

When you begin to develop a home-prepared diet, make sure your puppy gets everything it needs in its diet to keep it as healthy as possible and help it grow. The best way to do this is to consult with your veterinarian. You might even want to ask for a referral to a veterinary nutritionist.

Working with a vet, you can design a diet that meets all of your puppy’s nutritional needs. Your vet may have recipes for you to use or may guide you to a website like BalanceIT.com or PetDiets.com. These websites have recipes developed by veterinary nutritionists. They can help you choose a diet that is complete and balanced but also meets other needs. In many cases, you can choose your preferred ingredients or find formulas designed for puppies with specific needs or health issues .

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Dogs Unique Dietary Needs

It helps to understand a bit about the history of dog diets first: As both capable hunters and scavengers, dogs ate from a diverse menu when they began accompanying humans. An omnivorous diet of protein, carbohydrate and fat sources is most healthy for them pups in good health can handle the fat in their diet more effectively than humans can â their bodies use it for energy and then efficiently clear it from the bloodstream.

The caveats? Dogs have different nutrient requirements than people. For example, they need high-quality protein, more calcium and more minerals for their proportional body size. Calcium is particularly critical. In The Complete Holistic Dog Book, co-author Dr. Katy Sommers, DVM, notes that âcalcium is perhaps the single most important supplement for a successful home-cooked diet. Even if youâre feeding a variety of foods, youâll need to supply an extra source of calcium.â

Tools For Making Homemade Dog Food

In addition to cooking your dog’s food in a dutch oven, you also have the option of making it in a crockpot or Instant Pot. This makes cooking the food extra easy as you can put all the ingredients in and let your slow cooker work its magic. Another option is baking a dog-friendly meatloaf in the oven in a Pyrex dish or a disposable meatloaf pan. You can slice it up in single-meal portions and freeze it.

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Guidelines To Creating Balanced Homemade Dog Food Recipes

Following are guidelines for feeding a raw or cooked home-prepared diet to healthy dogs. No single type of food, such as chicken, should ever make up more than half the diet.

Except where specified, homemade food for dogs can be fed either raw or cooked. Leftovers from your table can be included as long as theyre foods you would eat yourself, not fatty scraps.

Meat and Other Animal Products: Should always make up at least half of the diet. A raw diet for dogs can be excessively high in fat, which can lead to obesity. Another potential hazard of diets containing too much fat: If an owner restricts the amount fed too much, the dog may suffer deficiencies of other required nutrients.

Unless your dog gets regular, intense exercise, use lean meats , remove skin from poultry, and cut off separable fat. Its better to feed dark meat poultry than breast, however, unless your dog requires a very low-fat diet.

Raw Meaty Bones : If you choose to feed them, RMBs should make up one third to one half of the total diet. Use the lower end of the range if you feed bony parts such as chicken necks and backs, but you can feed more if youre using primarily meatier parts such as chicken thighs. Never feed cooked bones. Read a full report on raw meaty bones here.

Boneless Meat: Include both poultry and red meat. Heart is a good choice, as it is lean and often less expensive than other muscle meats.

Homemade Dog Food For Renal Disease Recipe

You NEED to consult with a vet or canine nutritionist before switching your dog to a kidney-friendly diet. The professional you work with will likely recommend either a low protein homemade dog food diet or some low protein dog food brands with lower phosphorus levels and are made with high-quality proteins.

• 1 cup boiled chicken
• 1 hard boiled egg
• 2 tbsp. plain yogurt
• 1/4 cup cooked brown rice
• 1/4 cup steamed carrots
• 1/4 cup steamed green beans

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Healthy Dietary Changes In Shih Tzu

Here are some key ingredients you can add to your Shih Tzus diet to fight allergies and/or promote a luscious coat and skin.

Many Shih Tzus also struggle with skin and coat issues. Their hair becomes dull and thin, and some Shih Tzus are constantly scratching or biting at their skin due to allergies. The solution, add a couple of squirts of dog-specific fish oil to his food to provide relief and nourishment to affected areas.

Dog food containing high-quality fish oil has been suggested to improve skin, coat, and digestive health.

What Should I Look Out For If I Choose To Feed A Raw Diet

If you are determined to feed raw there are some things you can do to minimize the risk of your pet and family members from getting sick.

Raw meals that are home-prepared should follow a recipe formulated by a board-certified veterinary nutritionist. This will ensure that the diet is truly tailored to the needs of your pet and that all the essential nutrients will be present in the correct amounts.

During meal prep, be mindful about any surfaces that come in contact with raw meat. These will need to be disinfected with hot soapy water. The bowl that your pet uses for the meal will also need to be thoroughly cleaned after use.

Another option to ensure that your pet is eating a balanced raw meal is to choose a pre-made commercial diet. Choose a food that states that it is complete on the label. This means that it has been formulated to meet established nutrient requirements.

Whether your commercial raw food arrives as fresh, frozen, or freeze dried, closely follow the directions on the package for meal preparation and clean-up.

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Tips For Making Dog Food

• Dogs don’t need the seasoning that humans do. Don’t add salt, pepper, or any other herbs or spices.
• Fresh vegetables are usually cheaper than canned or frozen, and they have more vitamins if they are picked at peak ripeness.
• If you must use canned vegetables, check for those with the lowest salt content.
• Make the food in large batches so that you only have to prepare it once a week at most. Freeze and thaw for easy feeding.
• Be mindful when using human leftovers. They may have butter, seasonings, or other ingredients that are not good for your dog. If so, don’t use them.
• Always check with your vet before changing your dog’s diet. Transition them onto the new diet over 1 to 2 weeks to avoid stomach upset.