Homemade Healthy Dog Food

I have two dogs, Sam and Bud. A border collie and a golden retriever. The commercial dog food recall this past year has completely redefined my thinking regarding what I feed my dogs. As most people did, I just dumped generic commercial dog food in their bowls twice a day, and that was it. My duties as a pet owner had been done, or so I thought. However, with this pet food recall, I had to throw out the food I had been feeding them, and I went out and bought another brand. However, the next week, the new brand I was using also recalled the food, so I had to throw that food out also.

I started doing some research, and found out that even before the dog food recall, commercial dog food did not contain all the necessary vitamins and minerals for my dogs. I finally ended up buying a few books on homemade dog food recipes, and I began cooking a weeks worth of dog food on Sunday afternoons, refrigerating it, and feeding it to Sam and Bud. They are both much more energetic since I have started this, and I no longer feel like I'm gambling with their lives.

Following is a typical recipe:

BASIC DINNER
# 2 cups cooked brown rice
# 8 ounces meat such as ground beef, ground turkey, chicken or organs such as hearts, liver etc.
# 1 cup lightly steamed ( 3 minutes) vegetables, I use frozen bags of assorted veggies, dogs like broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, spinach, kale.
# 2 tablespoons bone meal (available in health food stores, cheap!)
# 4 tablespoons ground flax seed or flax oil (available in health food stores in bulk)
# 1/2 cup raw grated apples or 1/2 cup blueberry's

Method

1. Cook rice and cool.
2. Run vegetables through a food processor , just chop a bit, not mush, then steam vegetables and cool.
3. If using ground meats, cook till medium rare, then cool.
4. If using organ meat, run through food processor.
5. In a large bowl, add rice, meat, vegetables, bone meal, flax seeds or oil, apples or blueberries. Mix well and serve.