COOKING FOR DOGS
Would you prepare meals for your pooch? We explore the growing trend
Ididn’t set out to be a dog chef, but sometimes life is what happens while you’re making other meals. When we got our first dog, Barney – a delectable, teddy-bearish Border Terrier – 12 years ago, I did what most first-time dog owners do: I began by feeding him what his breeder fed him, then segued into a dry diet recommended by our vet. When we took him to his first puppy class, I stood in the Sunday morning drizzle of our north London park, bug-eyed with astonishment at a woman who arrived with a bag of organic, homemade liver treats. ‘Don’t let me get like that,’ I whispered to my husband.
And yet, here we are. Every day, I cook for Barney and his sister
Gracie, our two-year-old Dandie Dinmont Terrier. My gateway snack was a batch of doggie breath bones (biscuits crammed with parsley, for sweetness of breath). Once I began making those, it was a short step to doggy meatloaves, braised beef cheeks and pupcakes. And in the end, as these things sometimes do, it became a book (see p120).
But perhaps it’s not so surprising. In my other life, I’m a food writer. I spend my life cooking for anyone who comes into my orbit: my family, my friends, my book club, the man who came to put up the new shelves, the woman who came to upholster the sofa. If you come into my house, it’s unlikely you’re going to escape without something to eat or, at the very least, a hastily scribbled recipe, or something spooned into containers for later. If I love you, I’m feeding you. So of course my dogs who, on my worst days, love me unconditionally, with tail-wagging, nose-bumping glee, are going to be front of the queue when it comes to cupboard love. They give me so much, the very least I can do in return is to ensure they have as healthy, happy and delicious a life as possible. Naturally, I avoid foods that are harmful to dogs: chocolate; grapes and raisins; onions and other alliums (though I do allow a little garlic from time to time); cooked bones; corn-onthe cob; fatty meat; and peanut butter with the sweetener
My dogs give me so much, the least I can do is ensure they have as delicious a life as possible
xylitol in it. And I ensure their diet is about 70 per cent meat, with the rest made up of healthy grains, vegetables and fruit
(as I write this, Gracie is chasing frozen blueberries around the kitchen floor – her favourite sport). The British are known as a nation of dog lovers. According to a 2018 survey from the Pet
Food Manufacturing Association, we now own nine million dogs between us; a rise of 300,000 in 2017. Just over a quarter of households share their homes, hearths and hearts with canine companions.
28 per cent of Good Food magazine readers own a dog, and 9.1 per cent of readers have more than two. Like all things, dog ownership is subject to the vagaries of fashion. Last year, according to the Kennel Club, Labrador Retrievers were knocked from first place as Britain’s top dog by French Bulldogs for the first time since 1990 – sturdy pocket rockets beloved by celebrities such as the Beckhams, Madonna, Hugh Jackman and Martha Stewart. It’s increasingly evident that the benefits of owning a dog extend far beyond the gleeful welcome when we come in the door. A 2017 study of 3.4 million people, published by Uppsala University in Sweden, found that dog owners can be 23 per cent less likely to die from heart disease. This was prominent among people who live alone, as dogs help to relieve social isolation with its associated stress and depression. Owning a dog may also lower blood pressure and speed up recovery from illness, and children who grew up with dogs were found to have lower rates of asthma and allergies.
Of course, the most obvious daily benefit to owning a dog is that it forces you outside in all weathers. But, as well as the exercise, it can open up your life in a beautiful way. I now have a whole gang of park friends, and we’ve been through births, marriages, deaths, divorces, illness and personal and professional triumphs together. They – and their dogs – are my daily glee club, and just knowing them enriches my life enormously. So, for me, this adventure that started with doggy breath bones and turned into a book is about more than what I feed my pooches. Their gourmet dinners are a very small reward for the daily joy they bring into my life. Along with millions of others, my canine companions make me a better, kinder, healthier person – and no bones (doggy breath, or otherwise) about it.