Think Outside of the Bag: Different Pet Food Options

There are quite a few different food options out there besides kibble.  Yes kibble is cheap and very convenient but there are much healthier options out there.  When you look at kibble, do you see fresh chicken, veggies, and fish?  No because the ingredients have been so highly cooked and processed that the healthy stuff has been cooked out of it and preservatives and color dyes have been added to form little brown balls of kibble.

Let's take a look at some different feeding options...

Dehydrated Pet Foods... The Honest Kitchen is one of the best known dehydrated pet foods. The Honest kitchen produces dog and cat foods, grain-free and grain foods, and a full complete meal or a veggie/fruit 'base' where you add your own protein. Foods are reconstituted with water (at each meal, not all at once), so a 10 lb box makes 40 lbs of food in the end. This particular brand has been on my radar for a long time and I have ordered the 7 lb box of 'base' where I can add my own raw protein.  Even though I feed a raw diet, I have been feeding 1 day of kibble every week simply to keep their bodies used to it if we ever needed to feed kibble in an emergency situation.  Using The Honest Kitchen's dehydrated food once a week can now replace kibble all together.

Homecooked foods... There are a number of excellent resources out there for you to prepare your own cooked pet food.  The nice thing about cooked foods is that you can re-freeze after a large food prep day, so no daily cooking for your pet.  Cooked foods are a great fresh option if you are skittish about feeding a raw diet.  Like feeding raw, you can buy ingredients in bulk when prices are low, and freeze them until you're ready to food prep.  Homecooked and raw foods both share the benefit of knowing exactly what you're feeding your pet.  In a time where pet food recalls are almost a weekly occurrence, it's reassuring to know you're in control of what your animals eat.

Chubs...  I often hear people refer to chubs as raw food... it's not.  Chubs are refrigerated pet food sealed just like the ground beef/turkey chubs in the grocery store.  Chubs are essentially the commercial version of a homecooked diet.  FreshPet is carried in PetSmart stores and I have seen other stores like Target carry different brands.

Raw Food.. Raw food can either be homemade or commercially made.  It can also be 100% raw meat, or also contain fruits and veggies.  There are several commercially made raw foods like Nature's Variety and Stella & Chewys. I've found that feeding commercially made raw can be difficult when you live in a smaller town and maybe only one or two pet food stores carry it.  Homemade raw is how I've feeding the past 18 months or so.  It is more affordable if you have freezer space to stock up when prices are good and if you do your homework on buying options.  I currently feed about 12 proteins in rotation - some of these are store bought products like chicken quarters and pork, some I get from my raw feeding co-op where we using buying power to lower prices.  Can you believe I get ground elk/deer at only $2/lb!!  This is the benefit of belonging to a non-profit (volunteer) co-op. Homemade raw food requires doing your homework so you know your pets are getting a balanced diet, it requires freezer space to stock up when prices are good as well as storing the prepared food, it also requires you to be on top of keeping your kitchen sanitary.  Many people are concerned about salmonella and e.coli when feeding a raw diet, but fact is when you feed your pets raw meat you're a lot more meticulous of keeping your kitchen clean.

Ultimately these options all have 2 things in common: higher water content which helps with renal health, and ingredients that are not cooked until they form brown balls otherwise known as kibble.  One thing I need to stress if you decide to prepare your own pet food - Do Your Homework! Read read read, join a group of others who have been feeding homemade so they can help guide you, and ultimately 'know thy pet'.  This means all pets are different, have different nutritional needs and react to foods differently.  You know your pet best and need to be an advocate for their health.

If you want to slowly introduce fresh foods to your pet, you can start by adding steamed veggies, or cooked (and bland) meats.

There are also several books out there on home prepared foods - I recommend books by Steve Brown,  Dr. Karen Becker and Beth Taylor.  (I have been to Dr. Becker's nutrition seminars and Beth Taylor was a hydrotherapy client when I lived in IL).

Dr. Jean Dodds has an article on the 6 Forms of Processed Pet Food

Intro to Raw by Steve Brown

WebMD on raw food 

Here are some great books to check out...