I feed my dog and cat Purina dry food usually supplimented with some wet dog and cat food which they like okay, or table scraps of meat (what few times there are any) which they LOVE! Like everything I've watched the price of can dog and cat food inch up and it finally hit me that I can buy cheap cuts of meat instead, which cost no more (less actually), and is probably better for them. So now that's what they get with their dry food and they LOVE it!
I picked up a family pack of chicken thighs and "varied thickness" pork chops on sale for $2.69-$2.99 per pound and baked enough for 5-6 days, the rest goes in the freezer. Neither one seem to like eggs very well but if I can get them used to eating them I'll add them in the rotation.

We add table scraps or meats we buy from the market to our dog's dry food. She loves it, whether it's turkey, chicken, ham or especially steak or ground beef. Like you said, no reason to buy expensive cuts, they're not that fussy. I, also, buy shredded cheddar on sale and add that at times.

We serve our little 17 lb dog a raw meat diet of 90/10 ground beef, raw egg, calcium powder, string beans, puree pumpkin ... and some other stuff. Package it into 1 lb bags and freeze (make 5 lbs, sometimes 10 lbs at a time).

The little guy also enjoy chicken treats that we make ourselves from a Costco bag of breasts, sliced up thin and dehydrated.

And he gets bites from our plates ...

I feed my pup a partial raw diet. I also make a homemade food that is cooked and use a dehydrated food to make sure that isn't always a balanced meal. It cost me $200.00 for just over two months of food.

The raw I order from Midwest Legacy Beef, it's the BLT with bone. Along with raw chicken Paws, wing tips (sometimes whole raw wings), eggs.

The homemade cooked is a balanced meal and if you like I could post the recipe.

The dehydrated food is The Honest Kitchen.

My pups Vet always tells me how beautiful her coat is, bright her eyes are, and how healthy she is.

Oh, and after I switched to the raw diet, she eats more slowly, because she actually has to chew.



ARman

So you just feed the meat to them raw?

Well, wild dogs usually don't barbeque their kill

Rarely fed ours table scraps, found it leads to the dogs hanging around anyone that is eating, with small grand kids hanging around don't need the hound taking food from their hands.

Often wondered about the home made dog foods, we tried it when we were dealing with skin problems, to no avail, ended up with a dry food as suggested here that deals with yeast issues that cured the problem.

We do add in Nordic Natural Omega 3 oil per our vets instructions and it works well, dog loves it, and it's good for the skin/coat.

Read where adding in green beans to a home made dog food is a good idea, probably here...

Clark gets a topper on his evening kibble, this is usually a commercial stew-type product, but looks and smells human-grade. Once in a while, perhaps twice a month, he'll get scraps from our dinner, gristle/trimmings from a steak, etc., just what we don't finish, and which isn't enough to use in a future meal. He never gets anything of ours until we are completely done and are cleaning up the dishes, this seems to have countered any begging at the table.

quote:

Well, wild dogs usually don't barbeque their kill

No, they just leave it in the sun for a few days, the poor man's sous vide.

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Originally posted by HRK:
Well, wild dogs usually don't barbeque their kill

True. I just Googled it and according to the American Kennel Club:

"Eating raw or undercooked pork is not safe for dogs or humans due to the parasite trichinella spiralis larvae, which can cause a parasite infection known as trichinosis. An infection transmitted by pork meat, it can occur when a dog eats the muscles of animals infected with the trichinella parasites."

Not sure about chicken....

Raw is probably not the best idea, although, you could pick up some raw sushi grade tuna and they'd be ok with it, and suck it right up...

Agree table scraps in the bowl is acceptable, nothing from the table, encourages bad habits, my daughters dog will sit on his hind end for an hour begging LOL...

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Originally posted by ridewv:

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
Well, wild dogs usually don't barbeque their kill

True. I just Googled it and according to the American Kennel Club:
"Eating raw or undercooked pork is not safe for dogs or human……parasites."

Big difference between raw/undercooked pork and beef.

quote:

Originally posted by ridewv:
Not sure about chicken....

When we roast a whole chicken, we always cut up the heart and liver for our cats. They eat it raw and really like it. They also love raw chicken fat. So far no problems and our oldest is pushing 20 yrs.

We don't feed a raw diet otherwise. I do have one cat who is crazy about boiled peanuts. When I eat them, I have to share. She's very excited about college football season starting this weekend; we always have boiled peanuts during football season.

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Smokey and Bandit get Purina Complete cat chow exclusively. Wet food makes them spew and the Vet advised against it.

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Believe it or not, my cats won't touch meat or chicken, like we eat. My two outside cats get dry food and whatever they supplement on their own. My inside cat can only stomach a small amount of canned cat food so her diet is mostly dry food.

I don't buy any dog or cat meat.

My 3 small dogs get boneless skinless chicken breast topped with mild cheddar cheese once a day and dry food is always out if they want it. Chicken used to be $1.69-1.99lb, now it's about a dollar a lb more. The oldest will be 18 in Sept and is still doing fine.

Walmarts chicken breasts were $2 a lb until recently. My wife boils them, & mixes the chicken & unseasoned green beans with kibbles for our beagle. No table scraps ever.

My dog gets ground beef (baked into meat balls for easy portioning), boiled chicken (cheap dark meat), sweet potato, mixed vegetables, brown rice, fish oil, and pumpkin.
I usually buy everything when on sale and thrown into the deep freeze and I make 30 days at a time and freeze in quart bags. I supplement in high quality dry kibble and keep a bowl available to him throughout the day.

We lighly boil chicken breast and run it through the food processor with some cooked rice. Form into patties and finish in the dehydrator. We will break one patty and mix with Blue Buffalo dry.

My 2 Cats would eat nothing but Costco Rotisserie Chicken given the choice. They know the sound of the container as it is coming in the door.

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Originally posted by jhe888:
I don't buy any dog or cat meat.

Haha. Nice!