Hi Guys!!  I hope you and your pets are enjoying your summer.  What I do know, is that you, like myself, are a good pet mommy or daddy. You wouldn't be reading this if you weren't.  And we absolutely love our babies.  We cannot think of the day we will not have them.  I remember when I was growing up with our dogs, my Mom would give our dog scraps all of the time and did it shorten their lives?  I think not.  But we now know there are actually some foods that are toxic.  We have so many conspiracies out there at this time that I am on board with the ones that say that dog food companies put lots of preservatives and pieces and parts of even roadkill into the food. In order to counteract the bacteria, they add other antibacterial sprays and vitamin additive sprays and who knows what else. Would you want to take those things into your own body daily? If you wouldn't eat it, why would you give your baby something gross or dangerous to their health?  Guess what?  It's not that hard to feed your baby good food.  A couple of decades ago, I did some research on my own and came up with a delicious meal that your best girlfriend would want to eat, ask Carol!  Hahaha, she was like, "Ooooh, Mel, what are you cooking?"  I said, get your little hands off the pot, it's for Rusty Roo Roo!"  Oh yes, Rusty would come to the bowl as soon as it was mealtime and ate every drop and licked it clean, every single time."  He was my last pup, but they all did the same thing.  Rusty Roo lived to 19 and 6 months.  Yes.  His only ailment was his retina disease, he became blind at 14.  It was hereditary.  Check with your breeder for diseases like this.  I loved my doggies no matter what. I was the puppy Mom with the minivan.  They all sat, even  Daisy Cat and we'd go for a pupcup (cup of whipped cream) at McDonalds.  They were totally healthy.  So, it was with all my poodles, they all became blind at 14.  It's a poodle thing. With that in mind, I added carrots to the recipe.  My dogs eat cleaner than me.  So, I wanted to share my homemade recipe.  I did share this recipe from time to time with my customers who came to my shop in Breckenridge and since then I noticed a few dogfood companies who made food that was pretty much the same thing.  One that comes to mind is Farmers Dog.  Yes, I know, I could have come out with a dog food  and treat line, but, it's just not what I wanted to do.  I'm glad someone did though.  So, if you don't want to cook once a week and pack it for single sized meals, freeze it and take it out one at a time, then Farmers Dog would be recommended.  But, if you want to save money, probably half, then here's my recipe and I'll give you some ideas for wholesome treats too later on.

So, you start with a protein. I choose ground turkey.  It's better for their digestion.  You can absolutely use Wagu ground beef or a lean ground beef from time to time to the recipe, but I wouldn't make it the regular protein. If regular beef is bad for your arteries, it is for them too. Rotissery chicken has salts and spices, so no.  Lamb is expensive, pork is too hard to digest to use as the main protein. You can give your baby a piece of bacon when you are eating but not too much.  So for every pound of meat use one cup of white rice.  Do not use brown rice as their intestines are super short and do not have the time to digest brown rice, same as pork.  Also, it's important to note that rice naturally has arsenic in or on it somewhere and you must must rinse the rice in the pot until the water is clean.  Use two cups of filtered water per cup of rice. Put rice on high heat until it starts to boil for a couple of minutes then cover it and turn off the stove.  Let it sit there while you cook in a separate large 10" fry pan and cover.  I bought a pan specifically to cook this in as I use it every week.  Then you cook your ground meat.  Think of one pound of ground turkey per small dog or 3 pounds of turkey for a large dog.  Once ground meat is fully cooked, add in one cup of fresh or frozen blueberries per pound of meat, 3 carrots that have been pureed (Vitamix is best).  Carrots that are chunky may not cook through and you really don't want to take the vitamins out while it cooks through and if you don't cook them you will see carrot chunks not digested in their poop, same for kernels of corn.  Don't use corn.  Also, use a cup of frozen spinach or chopped fresh kale which I alternate weekly.  Let the blueberries, greens cook a few minutes in the juices of the meat.  Then add in your pureed carrots and a half can of pumpkin puree (NOT candied yamns).  For large dog recipe, use a whole can of pumpkin for digestion.  If you see your dog has runny poop, use less pumpkin next time.  Then mix well and add in the rice,  Be sure to scrape from the bottom to mix thoroughly.   Let cool and serve them their first serving..  Serving sizes are(Tiny and Small Dogs 1/4 cup three times a day. Medium Dog half cup 3 times a day and Large Dog 1 cup 3 times a day), morning, afternoon and evening.  When you eat dinner, they do too.   You should use a measuring cup and spatula to level it off and package in sandwich bags then put seven bags in a larger ziplock freezer bag.  Large dogs, you will wind up with 2 large freezer bags and will make 5 or 6 days worth and well worth your time.  Think, this is a labor of love for your baby.  Also, if you want to, sprinkle every few meals a little salmon oil or olive oil on top.  Also every once in a while sprinkle a little tumeric on top as well.  And you can sprinkle a tiny amount of salt on top.  

I hope you both enjoy the benefits of cooking for your pup!  Next time I will give you my treat recipes.

See you on the walkies and don't forget the poop bags!!!  Hahaha

This is a picture of my greeters....Little Jack (loved the little girls) and Rusty Roo too who greeted every single customer.