Homemade Plant-based Dog Food
The go-to plant-based meal for your pets is rice. It is easy to prepare, inexpensive, and can be used to get your furry friends to swallow all kinds of healthy vegetables that they otherwise wouldn’t care for. Gandhi has a big plate of rice almost every day. Some days he has two big plates of rice. Other days he has one big plate of rice, and another meal of raw fruit or cooked beans or vegetables. In any case, homemade vegan dog food is much healthier than store-bought food, which is normally made with low quality harmful ingredients, such as diseased animals. Even if you buy a vegan brand, it may contain colorants and preservatives, and it may be overly dry. No animal in the jungle opts for dry food, as this causes dehydration and may affect their health in other ways. When humans eat dry food, it accelerates ageing, as the dry food leaches water content from organs such as the skin, the bones and even the eyes, causing brittle bones, wrinkled skin, and vision impairment. In these two short videos, you will see Gourmet Gandhi eating a plate of rice, and licking his plate clean.
How to Prepare your Homemade Vegan Dog Food
Boil some water and add in the rice. Normally, you will use twice as much water as rice. For Gandhi, Bhumi and Tigrito, than means at least five cups of rice and ten cups of water, which requires a fairly large pot or cauldron. This amount will give both Gandhi and Bhumi two large plates of rice each, and one medium sized plate for Tigrito.
Add in your pets’ favorite spices. Our pets love cumin, as it has a sort of meaty stink to it. We also add a bit of Himalayan sea salt to ensure that our furry friends get the 84 minerals* that are found in Himalayan salt. We sometimes use curcumin for health reasons, but in small amounts because they don’t love its taste. You may want to use a mixture of spices such as Italian seasoning or ‘Montreal Steak Spice”, but if you use such a mixture, please read the label carefully to ensure it doesn’t contain Mono Sodium Glutamate or any other harmful neurotoxin.
Next, add in some finely chopped veggies from your fridge, even leftovers, to give them even more nutrients. The smaller you cut them, the more likely your dogs will slurp them up with the rice. If you add bigger pieces, they will pick and choose which ones they like to eat and leave the rest behind. For carrots or beets, we often use a grater or a peeler to ensure they get slurped up entirely.
Some days, we add in textured soy protein, which absorbs some of the water and takes on a texture similar to chicken or beef. Sometimes we add chia seeds or hemp seed hearts to give our pets some Omega 3.
* The 84 minerals found in Himalayan salt are: Oxygen, Calcium, Magnesium, Iron, Sodium, Phosphorus, Nitrogen, Cobalt, Iodine, Hydrogen, Carbon, Fluoride, Cadmium, Palladium, Aluminum, Chromium, Nickel, Silicon, Silver, Vanadium, Lanthanum, Gallium, Rubidium, Indium, Arsenic, bromine, antimony, ruthenium, rhodium tellurium, scandium, titanium, cesium, barium, lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, holmium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium, lutetium, hafnium, tantalum, tungsten, rhenium, osmium, iridium, platinum, gold, mercury, thallium, lead, bismuth, polonium, astatine, francium, radium, actinium, thorium, protactinium, rubidium, strontium, yttrium, zirconium, niobium uranium, tin, neptunium and plutonium.