Roasted Pumpkin (For The Dog!)

Each year at Halloween we carve our pumpkins, collect the seeds to roast, and throw out everything we have scraped and cut out of the pumpkin. I had been buying canned pumpkin to add to J's dog food (she LOVES pumpkin). After doing a little research and talking to other dog owners, I made our own pumpkin puree for her. Not only is it pretty easy to make, but she loves it and it is a healthy addition to her dog food.

It's really easy to do. Simply scrape out/trim the inside of your pumpkin. I removed the larger seeds since we roast them for us to eat. The stringy stuff and any of the meaty parts of the pumpkin are fair game. If there are a few of the small flimsy seeds, I left those in, but it's up to you. NOTE: I would only do this on a pumpkin that hasn't been carved yet and is in good shape. After it has carved, it can start to mold and could make your dog sick.

Line a large baking sheet or dish with parchment paper or aluminum foil. You want to use something that has sides since the pumpkin will release water as it bakes!

Place the pumpkin bits on the covered sheet and roast at 375 degrees F for about 30 minutes, until softened. Let cool. Place in a blender or food processor to puree. Make sure to get all the strings and any little seeds pureed.

After it is a nice mushy texture, I place it in ice cube trays and freeze. Once they are frozen, I pop them out of the trays and store in a gallon freezer bag. She gets 1 cube at dinner time. She loves them frozen in the summer, but I do sometimes heat them up in the winter.

If you are interested in reading more about the benefits of pumpkin for your dog, here are a few resources:

• AKC
• Pet MD
• Cesar's Way
• Of course, Google or your vet will be a great source of information as well!

Easy Dog Bed

We recently got a new bed and needed to get rid of both the old bed and the old foam memory topper. The 3" memory foam was still in good shape but didn't work for the kids' beds. I hated to throw it out, but couldn't think of what I could use it for. Until we had to go to the basement and our dog was not happy about it. We have an unfinished basement and sometimes need to go downstairs during tornado sirens. She used to hate going downstairs because there wasn't anywhere comfy to lay down on. I ended up using the memory foam to make at dog bed for the basement.

I had two 50x60 fleece blankets, which I had found at the store on sale for about $5. You could also simply buy pieces of fleece from a fabric store, I just had the blankets on hand. I measured a piece of the foam to fit inside the blankets, with a 3-4 inch gap all the way around. I then cut 1 inch wide, 4 inch deep slits along the edges of both blankets. I had laid the blankets on top of each other so the strips would line up together. Make sure the blankets are laying flat and smooth. Place the memory foam in the middle of the bottom blanket. Next, place and smooth the other blanket on top. Tie the tabs together all around the edges. Tada! You have a dog bed!

She is a big fan of her basement dog bed and now seems to enjoy when we hang out down there. The bed ended up pretty large. Which, of course, makes sense considering the size of the blanket but is something I might have trimmed down if I had thought it through. She loves it though.

I still had a decent sized piece left over, so I cut a piece to fit the inside of her crate. She already had a liner base and blankets, but I thought I would make a new pad for the inside of her crate with the left over foam. Once I cut a piece to fit, I wrapped it in an old twin bed sheet and put a few hand stitches in to make sure the foam would not be unwrapped and exposed. I piled her blankets back on and now she has a super comfy bed.

Peanut Butter Pumpkin Dog Biscuits

About 7 months ago, we adopted a retired greyhound. She is an amazing dog. She fits in with our family so well. The boys love playing fetch with her and teaching her new tricks. She motivates me to take walks everyday.

I wanted to try my hand at making dog treats because, well...she's a little spoiled. I wanted to try making something fun for her and also so I control the ingredients of her treats. Some of the store bought treats had recalls, some had additives that weren't really good for her, and the grain free treats are more expensive.

Why grain free treats? Before we adopted her, I did some research on what the best diet/food was for a greyhound. While there were a lot of options, wheat/corn free seemed to be the main consensus (other than continue eating raw). Although diet restrictions aren't completely new to us (our bridge girl could only tolerate eating Iams or she had massive stomach issues), raw was not the way for us to go (for a lot of reasons). So, we decided to go with a mostly wheat/corn free diet. Although her food is grain free, she does occasionally gets treats that are made with flour.

After playing around with a few different recipes, I created a peanut butter and pumpkin dog biscuit. It is definitely one of her favorite treats. The recipe is made with brown rice flour, although I have made the recipe with half whole wheat flour and half brown rice flour. I think you could also use all whole wheat flour. They store really well in the freezer (I layer and cover in wax paper in a plastic container). As soon as she hears the freezer open, she now comes running!

Because she loved them so much, we made extra batches at Christmas and gave them out to our friends with dogs!
 

PEANUT BUTTER PUMPKIN DOG BISCUITS

www.DailyMesses.com

You will need:

• 2 1/2 cups brown rice flour
• 1 tablespoon flax seed
• 5 to 6 tablespoons water
• 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter (NO Xylitol, it's fatal to dogs!)
• 1/2 cup pumpkin puree (not sweetened or seasoned). You can add another 1 teaspoon if the dough is too dry.

Directions:

1. Mix ingredients together. Start with 5 tablespoons water. It is a dry dough. However, if you can't get the dough to stick together, add either 1 tablespoon of water or another 1 teaspoon of pumpkin puree. I found the best way to work with the dough was to mix dry ingredients together with a fork, then add in the peanut butter, pumpkin and water. Mix with fork, then switch to mixing and pushing the dough together with your hands. It comes together better using your hands to mix/squish the dough together than just using a fork. (The top of the picture below shows what just mixing the dough with a fork looks like (crumbly), bottom of picture shows when mix/squish together with your hands.)
   
   
2. Roll out. I found it easiest to shape dough into a ball and then roll out on parchment paper.
3. Cut out shapes and place on a cookie sheet. I used all kinds of cookie cutters to make the shapes (rabbit, squirrel, dog bone, heart for Valentine's Day, pumpkin for Halloween/Thanksgiving, star and mini tree for Christmas, oval for Easter eggs, mini flowers for Spring or Easter).
4. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20 minutes. Flip over. Bake another 5-10 minutes or until dry.
5. Cool completely. Store in an airtight container.  I like to keep a few out and then freeze the rest. She likes them frozen as well.

Optional:

• You can decorate these with carob (while it looks like chocolate, it is not toxic like chocolate is) or yogurt chips.
•  These make cute gifts! I stamped names into the treats before they baked. I also decorated a few with carob. I placed in baggies and gave them out at Christmas.

Click here for a PDF printable recipe!
NOTE: I'm trying out adding a link for the PDF to make printing easier. Please let me know if it doesn't work and I can try something else!

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