I was at the book store perusing the bargain aisle when I came across the Good Treats Cookbook for Dogs. I picked up the book and the first page I flipped to was a recipe for Pumpkin Twists. Needless to say, that recipe caught my attention. I continued to flip through the pages and found a lot of recipes that I thought the pugs would love. There were Banana Peanut Butter Biscuits, Apple Kissed Peanut Butter Treats and even some frozen treats that I thought would be perfect for the pugs after a walk in the hot FL evenings.
For my first dog treat baking experience I decided to try to make Chicken Ginger Biscuits. I was worried that the pugs weren't going to like them, but after they got their first taste Benny promptly scratched on the pantry door for more. Success!
Here is the recipe for the Chicken Ginger Bones if you would like to give it a shot.
Ingredients
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1/2 cup chicken broth (I used low sodium)
1 egg, slightly beaten
1/4 cup vegetable oil
Directions:
Preheat oven to 375°F.
In a medium bowl, combine flour, wheat germ, and ginger.
In a second bowl, combine the chicken broth, egg and oil. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix until well blended.
On a lightly floured surface, knead the dough and roll out to 1/4 inch thickness. Using cookie cutters, cut into desired shapes. Combine dough scraps and repeat rolling and cutting into biscuits until all dough is used.
Place biscuits on a greased baking sheet and bake for 25 minutes.
Whenever one of the pugs does something funny or noteworthy, I jot down a little blurb in my blog idea book. Later, when I'm looking for something to blog about, I have a whole book of ideas. I have notes in my book that I never got a chance to blog about before Sol passed. I thought I would share one of those stories today.
When it came to food, Solsey had a pretty strict set of rules that she followed. One of those rules was never, ever eat any fruit.
We quickly became aware of Sol's "Eat No Fruit" rule when she turned down tiny bits of bananas or apples on a regular basis. But we didn't realize how serious Sol's distaste for fruit was until she got picky about her Cheerios.
Each morning plays out about the same around here. We start the day with a bowl of Cheerios and a banana. However, we are a two Cheerio flavor household. One of us eats Apple Cinnamon Cheerios and the other Honey Nut Cheerios.
We offer the pugs a tiny bite of banana each morning and of course Sol always turned hers down. So, we started offering Sol a Cheerio instead. If it was an Apple Cinnamon Cheerio, Sol would turn that down as well. If it was a Honey Nut Cheerio, she would woof it down and ask for another.
Mix a handful of Apple Cinnamon Cheerios with a handful of Honey Nut Cheerios, put the mix in a bowl and give it to Sol and when she was done eating you would have a bowl full of Apple Cinnamon Cheerios left.
As soon as we got to the car after picking Benny up from his brachycephalic surgery I knew he was going to be OK. In our excitement to go pick Benny up, we forgot to remove a small container of kibble that we brought with us to his pre-surgery visit the day before.
His pre-surgery appointment required fasting and we weren't expecting to leave him so we brought a small meal to give him after his visit. But, Benny ended up staying for his surgery so there was no need for the meal we brought with us.
When we picked Benny up to bring him home the next day, he sat on my lap on the passenger seat. After about a minute or two, he went to the back seat and immediately found the bag of kibble that we had previously brought.
He smelled and stared at the bag for a bit and then he started whining and barking at the bag. Except, his bark wasn't quite back so soon after his surgery. I have only a tiny clip of his barking, but it is enough to give you an idea.
Benny's little tantrum went on for about 60 miles and then finally we were back home. Once home, we followed doctor's orders and gave him a soft meal. He gobbled it up and then took a much needed nap.
I have talked about things I have learned from the pugs over the years (Henry, Benjamin and Luna), but I don't think I have talked much about things the pugs have learned from each other.
When Sol walked into our lives, Luna picked up one of Sol's personality traits very quickly - the act of saying no. Before Solsey arrived, I think Luna did a lot of things because the boys did them. She ate her piece of banana each morning because the boys seemed to love it. But, it was plain to see that Luna was not very fond of bananas.
The first time Luna watched Sol turn down a bite of banana a lightbulb went off in her head. Sol smelled her banana offering, gave a big huff, spraying snot all over the banana and everything else in close proximity and then looked up with her big brown eyes asking, "What else you got?" In a sign of solidarity, Luna turned down her bite of banana that morning too.
In the short 15 months that Sol was with us, Luna took pride in turning her nose up at many of our offerings. And without Sol, Luna continues to carry the torch. This morning, she didn't even bother to come to the breakfast table to turn down her banana. From the couch, she declared "Bananas, who needs stinkin' bananas!"
When we took Benny to the vet for his cough a few weeks ago we talked with our vet about breathing issues in pugs and ways to deal with the hot weather here in FL. Our vet had a few good tips for us. For example, he suggested that we swap our evening walks for early morning walks. Morning walks would be a bit better for the pugs since the pavement would be cooler in the earlier part of the day. Clearly something I should have realized, but I think my disdain for all things morning got in the way.
Another thing he mentioned was keeping the pugs as trim as possible. Keeping them at an ideal weight not only helps them deal with the heat, but also helps with breathing issues that chronically plague pugs.
Our vet also pointed out that Benny was up a pound from his last visit in September 2009. At our recent visit, Benny weighed in at 25.4 pounds.
The truth is that we have become very relaxed with our treats and table scraps rules. When the boys were younger, we were very diligent in making sure the boys stayed fit and trim. Our main motivation was Henry and his hips. When Henry was diagnosed with hip dysplasia, we were told the best thing we could do for him was to keep him at a healthy weight.
So the boys grew up on carrots for treats and very rarely ever got a scrap from the table. But, over the years we gradually started giving them a little bite of dinner or breakfast and then dinner and breakfast. Heck, for about 15 months they got a little bowl of spaghetti each week. (But no one has had any spaghetti since Solsey passed. I just haven't been able to bring myself to make it.)
So, we are making a few lifestyle changes around here. Table scraps are being cut way back and I stocked the fridge with carrots. The difficult thing so far is that Luna does not like carrots. So it is a real pain to give the boys carrots and Luna something else. Especially, when I have not been able to come up with a healthy something else that Luna likes.
Our goal is to have the boys lose 3-4 pounds and Luna to lose around a pound. The weight has slowly crept on the pugs so our approach is to have it slowly creep off. We are in no rush and are not making any drastic changes so hopefully over the next year or so we can get the pugs in a bit better shape. The downside is that the FL heat is in full force now and the pugs usually gain a bit of weight during the summer months because their walks and any other outdoor activity is severely limited if not totally eliminated by the heat.
So, our short term, summer goal is to be more mindful of extra curricular eating and not have the pugs gain any it's too hot to even move weight. And remember, the camera adds 10 pounds
I have been trying to work on capturing action shots of the pugs to help improve my photography skills. Well, that, and my collection of photos of the pugs sleeping or being lazy is getting out of control.
While my skills as a photographer haven't really improved, I have been getting a good laugh at some of the photos I have been taking. Today's photo is a prime example.
I have found that the best way to get the pugs to "do something" is to play our treat catching game. The game never disappoints as it always gets the pugs moving and me laughing.
In this case, we have Henry intently focused on catching a treat I just tossed in the air. The focus, and the touch of crazy in his eyes just kills me. And Henry subscribes to the theory that the pug waits for no treat. His technique is not to wait for the treat to get to him, but to jump up and snag it out of the air.
