Raw dog food diet recipe

What is the best for your dog: Canned food, dry food or raw food?

Dogs usually eat everything (grass, mud, your favorite shoe) but they need good food to be strong and stay healthy. There are many different types of food for all life stages of the dog. To determine which feed is best for your pet, the amount of extra vitamins and what he or she needs you can best rely on the information from your vet. Below I have gathered some general and useful information.raw dog food diet recipe

Tips on Dog food

Feed your dog every day at the same time (approximately). If your dog eats using a fixed schedule, then it will be easier to predict when he will need his walk. This prevents squeaking and barking and an unexpected outlet sessions

Don’t change too much in your animals diet: animals do not need other tastes like we humans do. On the contrary, their digestive system likes to accustom itself to a certain routine and food type. If you would like to switch to another food (eg food from puppy to adult dog food), mix the new food in increasingly larger portions of the old food. Thus, transition is more gradual and will cause less problems.

Try not to give human food scraps to your dog. Human food is often too rich in carbohydrates and lacks the high mineral content of dog food. This results in unhappy, overweight pets! Keep an eye on portions, don’t give your dog too much food. Guidelines are subject to the brand of food so read the label!
Make sure your dog always has fresh clean water available. Replace water at least once a day.

raw dog food diet recipeDry dog food or canned food?

Opinions are divided over what is better, in reality studies show there is not a big difference. Life expectancy and happiness of the animals are comparable. Look for the best choice by checking the health of your individual dog and think of the convenience for yourself. Especially with canned or fresh food the dog should eat it in one go as it can turn bad and smelly on hot days.

Dry

  • Contains less water than canned food
  • Cheaper
  • More suitable for large dogs
  • Better for the dentistry
  • Some dogs (especially puppies) struggle with too hard lumps

Canned

  • Smaller portions, more suitable for small dogs
  • It can stick to the teeth and cause dental problems
  • More fragrance, difficult for dogs to resist
  • Mixed with dry food it forms a meal that no dog can resist

Dog ages and their food.

Puppy food is for dogs up to 1 years old. Some vets recommend puppy food for pregnant dogs because of the higher nutritional content.

Happy, healthy, adult dogs can basically eat the same food every day. Follow the instructions on the packaging, the tips of the veterinarian and pay attention to whether there is any change in the behavior of your dog’s performance. There is special food for small dogs (<25kg) and for large dogs (> 25 kg) on the market.

Organic dog food contains only organic ingredients (the name says it all).

Dog Treats?  You can use treats to train your dog, reward or just spoil. Generally your dog will love them, so make sure you do show love to your dog by not overdoing it and keep your pet healthy.

Ingredients are important

As said the veterinarian usually knows what is best for a dog. Yet you can take care that your animal receives the proper nutrients. It is obvious, but expensive food of good quality meat often contains better quality ingredients then the cheaper version.

What is a good raw dog food diet recipe?raw dog food diet recipe

A different option when it comes to what you feed your dog is raw food. This is a little more work for you as owner as raw food can only be kept in the freezer longer term and before it is given to your dog needs to be defrosted (unless your dog really loves meat ice cream…).

We have personally seen some great health improvements when changing to raw food. Our dog started to have some arthritis issues on the back legs. After a few weeks on raw food the symptoms where gone. We did feed him dry food that contained grains until we started to read more about this and found out that grains sometimes are not ideal for dogs. All this depends on the breed and other factors like amount of exercise that your type of dog needs. Also things like neutering can have an effect on the health of your dog.

We have been trying different things. It is possible to buy ready made fresh and frozen raw food for pets.

There are 2 options: Either full raw meat from the butcher, or meat with some added veggies and oils. We do believe it is preferable to add some other ingredients to the raw meat. In nature, dogs will also eat some greenery and roots if they are left to look after themselves.

Buying the ready made raw food with the added ingredients can be quite expensive. Therefore we have been testing what want down well with our dog. We just made a large batch and froze the right size portions so we could just get from the freezer what we needed for a day. Easy!

So this is in our opinion a good raw dog food diet recipe:

  • 3 pounds ground beef
  • 4 ounces chicken livers
  • 1 medium carrot, chopped
  • 1 small apple, cored and in small pieces
  • 1/2 cup baby spinach or baby mixed salad
  • 2 whole eggs (including shell)
  • 1/2 cup plain yogurt, preferably full fat
  • 1 tablespoon ground flax seed
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil

Mix it all together and take off portions that are the right size for your dog. Off course you can change it around a bit depending on what you have in the fridge. We sometimes use a zucchini, a pear and sometimes different kinds of oil, or extra seeds (sunflower seeds).