Dry Dog Food

I made up the one dry dog food recipe I found online and I am impressed with the result.  It took almost no time to make up the batter.   It was of the consistency of pancake batter and poured really nicely into the baking pan.

When it came out of the oven 40 minutes later, it was the consistency of gingerbread.  When I cut it into chunks I saw that I probably should have baked it a bit longer.

Louie is a fan of this kibble, I suspect using salmon stock made it irresistible to him.

Next time I make it I will triple the recipe.  The amount this made is enough for a week for Louie, he is a big dog and eats a fair bit.

Dog Food, the Next Step

I am going to try and make my own dry dog food.   At the moment I pay $43 for 8kg of decent dry dog food, this is about 64 cups by volume.  Based on a recipe I found that will make 60 cups of dry dog food, I can do it for less than $20.

The reason I am going to do this is because I was struck by how expensive decent quality dog food is and how awful smelling the cheap stuff is.  It was as I was buying my latest 8 kg bag that I wondered what it would take to make my own and if their would some sort of recipes online.   I got home and found quite a few to try, I am going to start with a recipe from this page.

The core of all the recipes is effectively making a dough that gets baked into a hard cracker.   The doughs all contain a fair amount of fat which means it will go rancid fairly quickly, but if I make a reasonable amount at a time this will not be an issue.   Louie eats about 3 cups of kibble along with 1.5 - 2 cups of wet dog food each day.   A 20 cup recipe should be enough to feed Louie for about a week, though I suspect I will make more like 40-60 cups of the food at a time, the bin we have for the dry dog food can hold about 80 cups.  I wold prefer not to have to make dog food each and every week.

I will post some pictures of the kibble and write about how it all turns out especially the verdict from the hound.