I started making Atti's dog food several months ago. It's been a huge hit to say the very least. I've shared some of the food that I've made with a few other friend's dogs and they too have seemed to really enjoy it. It's not just the fact that she scarfs it down, but rather that her general health seems to have improved dramatically. She was already a pretty happy and healthy little dog, but now she seems to have much more energy, is way better disciplined, and definitely doesn't ever pass up the opportunity to have a meal.
It's a brown rice base with either lamb or turkey and a ton of vegetables. I would prefer to use lamb, but it winds up being considerably more expensive and so I instead use turkey. It's still more expensive than ground beef, but I generally read it's much better for dogs so I use it.
So with that, I thought I'd share the recipe with others.
Ingredients
- 50 plastic sealable bags - $2.88
- 6 lbs of 85% lean ground turkey - $19.98
- 4 cups low sodium chicken broth - $1.98
- 2 cups long brown rice - $3.05
- 2 cups organic carrots with stems - $2.98
- 2 cups spinach - diced - $1.38
- 2 cups kale greens - diced - $1.18
- 2 cups organic beets diced - $2.98
- 4 cups sweet potatoes diced - $1.56
- 1 Fuji apple - $1.44
- 1 Asian pear - $2.09
- 2 cups cucumber diced - $0.48
- 4 cups broccoli diced - $2.96
- 2 cups cauliflower diced - $3.18
Total Price: $48.12 (price per meal: about $0.96)
Required Tools
- cutting board
- large dutch oven with lid
- cast iron skillet
- large pot with lid
- sharp knife
- digital scale
Prepare the Rice
Add 2 cups of organic long brown rice into a large sauce pan. Add 4 cups of low sodium chicken broth. Add 1 cup of water. Cover with the pot lid. Bring the liquid to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer, and cook for about 35 more minutes or until all of the water is absorbed / evaporated.
Prepare the Vegetables
Wash the vegetables, but do not remove the skin. Dice all of vegetables except for the spinach and kale. Be sure not to include the seeds from the apple and the pear. Place all of the newly diced vegetables to the side.
Using a large dutch oven (or equivalent pot), place a little bit of olive oil at the bottom of the pot, add the vegetables while continuing to mix them up. Once all of the vegetables have been added, pour in about 4 cups of water. Cook over medium-high heat with the lid on. You'll occasionally need to remove the lid to stir up the vegetables. The goal is to soften them.
 My dutch over full of the vegetables that I'm steaming
Prepare the Greens
Dice all of the spinach, kale, and carrot top stems and place them to the side.
Prepare the Turkey
Using a cast iron skillet or equivalent, cook 3 pounds of turkey at a time. Start by coating the skillet with a light amount of olive oil or cooking spray. Add the turkey. Cook over a medium high heat until brown. You'll need to break the meat up using a spatula or similar tool. Once 3 pounds have been cooked, place them into a separate bowl and begin preparing the second 3 pound batch.
Blend the Vegetables
 The softened vegetables being 'ground up' in my Kitchen Aid
Mixing Everything
Once everything has been cooked, use a large bowl to mix everything together. Add the rice, the blended vegetables, and the turkey meat. Generously stir the bowl to ensure that everything is properly blended together. It will be about 15 pounds of food and will require some time and effort.
If you don't have a bowl that is large enough to mix all 15 pounds of food together, you can do this step in multiple mix stage. Just try to keep the portions as accurate as possible so that everything is properly mixed together during the final bagging phase. Otherwise you'll have meals that will be disproportionally heavy in either rice, meat, or veggies.
 Use a large mixing bowl to mix all of the ingredients together
 A bowl full of cooked brown rice ready to be mixed in
Portion and Store the Meals
Determine the sufficient quantity of food that is right for your dog. Atti gets about 5oz. Use a kitchen scale to determine how much of a sealable plastic bag constitutes a single meal. Portion all of the food mix into individual bags.
 50 bagged portions stored in 3 separate bags
At about 5oz per bag, I usually wind up getting about 50 meals worth of food out of the mix.
Seal the bags one-by-one and place them into a larger bag. Place this bag into your freezer.
Reheating the Meals
Take one of the meals out, add it into a bowl, and ideally add some boiling water to it. Let it sit out to warm up or place in the microwave for about 90 seconds. Be sure to stir the food sufficiently. Also be sure that it has properly cooled down before serving it.
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