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Lean, low starch, grain-free homemade raw food recipe for dogs (revised)

Dorothea Cornelius
How to make lean, low starch, grain-free dog food
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Prep Time 3 hours
Servings 40 portions

Equipment

  • 1 The Weston No.8 575 Watt heavy duty meat grinder
  • 1 Cooking pots, Buckets and bowls Make sure you have some large cooking pots at home for the veggies. Otherwise cooking them all will take forever.You should also have some 5 Gallon or larger buckets and/or bowls in the house to keep and mix your ingredients in.
  • 1 Clean kitchen gloves  If you are like me and don't like handling the meat dough with your bare hands
  • 1 Kitchen scale
  • Sealable plastic freezer bags* (I use 1 quart bags, which work just fine. If you bag a larger amount of food you should choose bigger bags)
  • A table spoon (optional) to fill the bags
  • Sanitizer  to clean utensils and areas afterwards

Ingredients
  

Meats and Organs

  • 30-31 lb Beef (makes for 50% of the batch, 0 calcium) If you get lean pieces, you do not need to trim the fat.
  • 10-11 lb Chicken hearts and beef liver (makes for 15-17% of the batch, almost no calcium)

Vegetables

  • 8 lb Carrots (1500 mg calcium)
  • 4 lb Broccoli (2000 mg calcium)
  • 3 Bags Split dried green peas (725 mg calcium) > makes ≈ 6 lb when cooked to mush
  • 1/2 bulb Garlic bulb (in small amounts just as for humans garlic is very beneficial for dogs)

Other ingredients

  • 24 24 eggs ≈ 3 lb (yolk delivers ≈ 1050 mg calcium, 24 egg shells deliver ≈ 58,000 mg calcium)
  • Limestone powder or another Calcium additive (calculation describes below)
  • 15 oz (= 450 ml) organic Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV) with MOTHER!!!! = 2tsp. = 10 ml for a 50 lb dog/ day 

Instructions
 

  • Preparing the batch
  • Soak the dried peas (or other dried legumes, such as lentils) over night, wash and cook them the next day. Note: Some say soaking is not necessary with peas and lentils, I do it.If you have never prepared dried legumes before, simply follow the instruction on the package.Why am I using dried legumes? Simple! They are just a lot less expensive than their fresh or frozen versions, but just as good.
  • Calculate the amount of calcium needed. Calculate the amount of daily food to be bagged.Make sure there is enough space in your freezer for up to 45 freezer bags with food or roughly 60 lb.Find a place for your dog, so he won’t steal. :)
  • Let the peas cook until they have absorbed the water and have turned into pea mush. When you cook legumes for your dog, always make sure they are cooked long enough and mushy. This aids your dog's digestive system to break down the nutrients and absorb them while half cooked legumes pass your dog's bowels almost unchanged.
  • Cut or break the veggies into rough chunks and cook them until they are ready to be mixed into a food mush. They do not have to fall apart, but should be soft enough for you to squeeze and split them with your fingers to make your mix.Use as few water as possible to help prevent the vitamins from washing out.Let all of your veggies cool.Note: Find more information on why the vegetables should be cooked in my FAQ section under "Homemade Food and Treats".
  • Crack the eggs and mix them in a bowl.Comment: After I have heard of some controversial discussions about the threat salmonella can pose to dogs, I have decided to walk on the safe side and cook the eggs. Frankly, I have never had any bad experiences with raw eggs. Yet, some people say that salmonella CAN indeed also affect dogs despite their different digestive physiology - why take the risk, right? :)Just letting you know. You can handle this as you like.Wash the shells and grind them in a porcelain mortar or a coffee grinder.Peel the garlic and mince it. Weigh the remaining amount of limestone powderMix the liquid or cooked and cut eggs, powdered shells, garlic, the weighed limestone powder (or bone meal) and other add-ons, if you use them, such as ACV and vitamins. If you need some more moisture to mix it properly take the broth from the cooked veggies. Just don't make it too mushy because the food will loose parts of this moisture later and become watery.
  • Grind or cut the liver. As an option you can first cook and then grind or cut it.
  • Mix the soft veggies with your egg-premix and the ground liver.This is the most disgusting part in the otherwise pretty appealing process of the food preparation. The liver almost becomes a viscous mass that does not smell too good. Premixing it into the eggs and veggies helps to take away the odor and feel of it.Oh, did I already mention it: Put on plastic gloves, if you do not like the feeling. :)
  • Grind the meat and the chicken hearts (can be mixed already) or use ground meat and your knife for the innards. As an option you can cook the chicken hearts before processing them.
  • Now combine your egg-egg shell-veggie-calcium-garlic-liver mix with your meat-chicken heart mix to an even dough-like mix. Do that very carefully to distribute all ingredients evenly in the mix.
  • Now you are ready to fill your freezer bags or containers. Use your kitchen scale and the spoon to bag the daily amount you have calculated before. Press the food dough a little until it completely fills the bag. Ty to remove as much air as possible because that helps prevent freezer burn. The result is a flat, sealed portion that can be easily stacked for storage in your freezer and is easy to split for feeding.

Notes

How to feed the raw food

For feeding take a frozen bag out of the freezer and let it thaw at room temperature for a few hours (store it in your fridge, if it is intended to be given the next day, fresh, thawed food should not stand at room temperature for longer periods of time).
Place it on a plate or get a plastic container to keep it in, such as the Lock & Lock Food Container, if you want to avoid any messes in your fridge or kitchen.
You will not have to think about that if you use plastic containers for freezing in the first place like suggested in my new comment above. :)
Do not microwave the food. Neither, flat bags or the containers do not take more than a few hours to thaw. Press one half of the thawed food out of the bag in the morning, reseal it and feed and the other half in the evening, if your dog is used to being fed twice a day.
Remember to take another package for the next day out of the freezer for thawing.
If you have not already added it to your batch during preparation, you can always add yogurt, cottage cheese, ACV, vitamins, fish oil or other additives as needed to the single servings when feeding them.
Note: If you are switching your Bull Terrier or any other dog from dry food, you may want to make it a slow transition, in case you notice runny stools in your dog for more than 1 day after feeding raw for the first time. Some dog's stomach reacts sensitive to changes and needs some time to adjust.
In this case just feed half and half (kibble and raw) for about a week or two and then switch to completely raw. That should get your dog's digestive system used to the change.
Here you find a list of valuable add-ons for your dog:
  • Nutri-Pet NUPRO Dog Supplement 5lb
  • Nutri-Pet Research NUPRO Joint Supplement for Dogs, 5lb
  • Bragg Apple Cider Vinegar (probably better priced at Walmart etc.)
  • Grizzly Salmon Oil
  • Now Foods Bone Meal

Calculations for daily food intake and Calcium

How much does it cost to feed my 45-50 lb dog raw?
 
This is only a sample calculation based on the food prices in 2014 in SW Florida.
$122.- for 30.5 lb beef (at BJ’s with BJ membership card, 3.99/lb)
$17.- for 10.5 lb chicken hearts/ liver (at Walmart)
$7.60 for 8 lb carrots (at BJ’s)
$8.- for 4 lb broccoli (at BJ’s)
$3.25 for 3 Bags of split dried green peas
$3.25 for 24 eggs (at BJ’s)
≈ $2  for 1/2 garlic bulb, limestone powder
(add $3.- for 1/2 bottle organic ACV (with mother!) if you use that)
______________________________________________________________
≈ $3.60/ day (without added vitamins, yogurt and fish oil)
≈ $110/ month

Calculation of daily raw food intake for your Bull Terrier or other dog

This is measured in percentage of body weight.
Note: This is a calculation for RAW food, not kibble!
Also these values are only for reference. Please adjust the daily amount depending on your dogs situation and condition. Just like humans, very active dogs may require more food than the average dog, for example.
  • 2% of bodyweight for overweight dogs
  • 2.5% - 3% to maintain the current weight
  • More % to fatten a skinny dog
Please talk to your vet, if you intend to feed your puppy a raw diet. Puppies have special needs and require up to 10% of body their weight in food each day.
Mila weighs ≈ 50 lb. She has an average level of activity with some more active days sprinkled in. She also gets her homemade treats and a daily amount of yogurt, salmon oil and vitamin supplement.
All of these aspects lead to a daily amount of 600 grams (≈ 1.3 lb) as the perfect amount of our raw dog food mix.

Update & note!

The daily calorie requirement of your dog not only depends on the size/ ideal weight, but also highly on the age and activity level of your dog. This recipe is designed for adult dogs over 12 months. Recently I had to increase Mila's daily food servings, because she is super active lately ans started to shed weight, although she already was in the ideal range.
Please be aware that the calorie requirement of a very active dog can make a difference of several hundred calories a day (around 1/3 more than average activity).
If you feel your dog is loosing weight on this diet, although it shouldn't, increase the food amounts (if the dog keeps loosing weight, that would be reason for a vet visit though).
Some people like to calculate their dog's calorie intake exactly in calories rather than in percent of the body weight in order to be a little more exact. To help you with those calculations I have now calculated the amount of calories in my recipe.
 
1lb of my low starch, grain-free homemade raw food delivers about 650 calories.
There are a lot calorie-based calculators on the internet.
But these two values may be helping already: The calorie requirements of an adult 50 lb dog on average activity level is said to be 700 - 900 calories.
The same dog, but highly active, can require up to 1400 calories a day

Calcium - simple but important

If you do not feed bones to your dog or another source rich in calcium, you may want to supplement Calcium in your dog’s diet when feeding raw. This is also true for this recipe, because it does not include bone.
Calcium is one of the most important minerals for a dog’s body, required in fairly high amounts for the bones, muscles, nerves and blood.
In addition, the Calcium - Phosphorous ratio is a very important parameter in the nutrition of your dog, because those two minerals work together in the skeletal system.
While Phosphorous usually is automatically fed in sufficient amounts just by feeding meats in a raw diet, Calcium may need to be added to balance the ratio, which should be 1.2 - 1.3 parts of Calcium per 1 part of Phosphorous.
Both over and under supplementing can have health consequences for your dog. Therefore it is advisable to calculate the Calcium requirement of your own dog and supplement appropriately.
The following calculation is intended only for reference. If insecure, please consult your vet to learn more about feeding the correct amount of Calcium.

Calcium calculation

  • 25 lb dog needs about 800-900 mg Calcium
  • 50 lb dog needs 1600-1750 mg Calcium
  • 75 lb dog needs about 2600-2700 mg Calcium
There is a pretty easy way to add Calcium to the batch: I simply use the egg shells from my recipe and powder them in a porcelain mortar (they should be ground/powdered to aid absorption). One egg shell weighs about 6-7 grams and contains about 37% Calcium*.
So from 24 egg shells I already have approx. 58,000 mg of Calcium. From the egg yolks come about 1050 mg*.
The Calcium from the beef and the innards can be disregarded, because they contain only a minimum amount.
My 18 lb of veggies deliver roughly 4225 mg of Calcium*.
So in my batch I already have 63,275 mg of Calcium*.
My dog weighs 50 lb and I am making food for 45 days. That means I will need a total amount of
78,750 mg of Calcium in her food.
Subtracting the amounts my food does already deliver, makes a remaining difference of 15,475 mg of Calcium I need to supplement.
Food grade limestone contains 75-90% available Calcium*.
That means I need to add 17.194 mg = 17.2 grams of food grade limestone.
There are also other calcium sources that can be used as additive.
*I have researched these values on the Internet. Please do your own research to confirm the correct amounts. I do not take over any responsibility for the values published in this recipe.
However, if you figure out any verifiable flaws in my calculation, please just let me know. I will be happy to adjust my recipe accordingly after reviewing your information.

The Weston No.8 575 Watt heavy duty meat grinder

This is s little investment to make that will pay off over time with convenience and effectiveness - I can tell you that.
It costs about $85-90, but is worth everyone of it. It grinds your 30 lbs of meat in no time and is good to make your own ground beef for hamburgers or meatloaf. I LOVE THIS THING!
Weston 575 Watt Electric Heavy Duty Grinder, Silver
Here is a snapshot of the Weston No.8 575 Watt heavy duty meat grinder packaging displaying all of its features and included accessory.
I hope my recipe helps you to make your perfect dog food.
If you have any questions or suggestions, feel free to let me know.
This is a work in progress and I hope I will come up with some more ideas in the future.
Enjoy making your own raw food for your dog!

Side note: As many efforts as I put into my recipes and as thorough my research may be, that still does not make me a nutrition expert. And I do not claim to be one. All of my advice is, of course just that - my personal advice - I do not give guarantees for anything.
In cases of doubt, please, always do your own research or double check with your vet!
Keyword Dog food