Anyone make their own dogfood?

[BramblePie]

I am trying to save some money and thought maybe making my own dog food could be one way.

Had anyone done this? Has anyone got a good recipe I can use? I googled it and got confused with all the different vitamins, protein, veggies they can eat and need so if someone already has the info it would be much appreciated.

Well, we feed raw so sort of make our own. We own a ranch though so we get everything for the food from our stock and operations. Our dogs have a lot of river fish too, which they love. Is feeding raw an option for you?

Dogs are omnivores, I feed mine on a mixture of dried food ( burns) and our leftovers. He is 15 slim and in good health. We eat healthy mainly unprocessed food, I am not sure about vet advice on this but the dried food certainly lasts longer when supplemented by things like rice, meat scraps, veg etc.

He hates mushrooms though and can carefully pick them out of a bit Bolognese

Hehe my dog never stops thinking about food. I have often come home and she has raided the food waste consisting of a whole salmon skeleton, leftover curry etc. I don't think she is the type of dog to pick out bits of anything really!

I am inclined to just give her our leftover maybe mixed with a bit of her dry food. I am just wary of all that dogs can be poisoned by and don't want to deprive her of any nutrients or anything. I also read that they can't process veg the same way we do so if you feed them carrots etc they should really be pureed.

Themother oh man - I am jealous! I want t live on a ranch! I think my dog has a sensitive tummy - even with chicken she has the runs :/
I was thinking of buying stuff fromt he butcher and cooking it then mixing with rice and a bit of dry food. Chicken hearts and liver etc - I assume this is cheap?

Thanks, we do love it! Ddog3 has a sensitive stomach but since she's been on raw its been pretty much cured (she was a rescue dog, our other two were too). I add a teaspoon of tumeric to their food once per day and that has really helped too. Our dogs are enormous though (18, 17 and 15 stone respectively) so if your dog is smaller its probably best to scale down the quantity.
That sounds good, when we lived in the UK I used to buy the supermarket value packs of frozen diced mixed vegetables, boil them up for bit (until they're mush), leave to cool then add them to meals too, like a sort of lumpy broth.

Good idea re. the frozen veg, that's what i'll do and thanks for the tumeric tip :)

Remember that lean meat has zero calcium so that must be provided by bones or bone meal or some other means.

I do a few meals a week for my dog. I don't bother with extra supplements or anything because it's not his main food.

I do mixtures of different things like eggs, mince, chicken, sweet potatoes, green beans, carrots, blueberries, a bit of brown rice, etc. Whatever things of that sort that I've got on hand.

Yes we feed a raw diet. 80% meat 10% bone 10% offal (half kidney half liver). We also give veg when we cook it for ourselves and raw coconut oil and the occasional egg including shell and sardines. I can't say it is cheap though but it is very good for her. We don't feed anything with grain as it is not good for dogs.

I was thinking of buying stuff from the butcher and cooking it then mixing with rice

You don't need to/shouldn't be cooking the meat. The rice needs to be cooked obviously...

I wouldn't cook the meat and I would skip the rice as there is no nutritional value in it. If you want to make your own food you really need to understand the how to make them nutritionally balanced. You can't just feed them whatever meat the butcher has on sale. You need to get the right percentage of muscle meat/bone/offal