Made without any sugar, no oil, fresh pureed strawberries, and some applesauce. This size is perfect for a little party of small dogs. I only serve them a small slice of cake of course! These are great for any holiday you might want to spoil your dog during! Any of the cakes that I come up with can be tailor made for any holiday or special occasion. Also, if your dog has any special food allergies, we can come up with a special cake just for your pup!
Pictures of my recent creation!
XOXO,
Jen
One of my goals is to create a ton of recipes in all sorts of dog baked goods categories. It’s fun to play around with ingredients in the kitchen and coming up with dog safe recipes. I am sure my dogs don’t mind all of the work that I do in the kitchen! So march 14th was my first Dachshunds “Gotcha Day” birthday. We adopted him, Decker, from All Texas Dachshund Rescue 3 years ago and we are more in love today then ever. His adopted brother came into our family a year ago. Every year I do something special for the boys on their anniversary. The first year Decker was with us he got to enjoy some breakfast with us. His second year, he got some steak and a cupcake. Some big changes happened in the last year with his health and now we have to closely monitor everything he eats. (I have his little story up in the About Us link) But long story short, Decker had been struggling with food allergies for the past three years. We had to eliminate wheat and anything with chicken protein. We also 90% eliminated anything with added corn and soy. We know that he is allergic to wheat and chicken (and other forms of poultry, but it seems as though he can tolerate some eggs here and there) but we like to keep tabs on other additives that are known to trigger dog allergies.
So along came my baking skills. I love to cook and bake for us humans already so I started making Decker some cookies here and there. Since we moved to Tucson, we eliminated ALL commercial treats and only offer the boys what I bake for them or fruits/veggies as treats. They also eat Natural Balance kibble. It’s not a bad idea to eliminated commercial treats. I had a hard time finding things that didn’t contain any of the ingredients that I didn’t want them to eat and if I did, it was only found at one store and was usually pricey. So with my talents in the kitchen, I figured, I can do that!
I took to my kitchen on March 14th to start playing with ideas on a dog birthday cake. Three hours later, I made an amazing cake for the boys and I was so very proud. I am going to share with you all the recipe and all of the steps that it took to make this cake. I wanted to go slow and do it perfect the first time so that I could take this as a sample cake for future customers.
(Cake)
1/4 cup of Canola Oil or Olive Oil
2 eggs
1-1 1/2 smashed Bananas
1 cup Rice Flour
1 teaspoon of Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon of Cinnamon
2 tablespoons Chopped Carob Chips
3 tablespoons of Apple Juice (Hold this off to the side until everything is mixed. I mainly used this for more liquid instead of adding anymore oil. Depending on the size of your bananas, you might not need this. Add the juice if you don’t have a thickish cake like batter after you mixed everything up!)
Mix the first 3 ingredients together. Don't use the Apple Juice until the end. It's just in case you need it!
Mix in the dry ingredients.
Mix in the Carob Chips. And this is when you can add the apple juice if your batter is to thick. You just want it to be like a cross between banana bread and a cake mix.
3.) This is where things start to get a little funny. (This recipe is enough to make a small little two layer cake. I didn’t need a huge cake. If you want to make a huge cake for a gathering of dogs, then double it.) I looked around my kitchen and realized that I didn’t have some small round baking pans. At some point the ones that I used for our wedding cake vanished. So I put my thinking cap on and came up with this awesome idea: I used my small stainless steel sauce pot. It’s the perfect size and it’s oven safe up to 500 degrees. Plus it’s not non-stick so I don’t have to worry about heating up the non-stick coating. Now, no matter what pans you decide to use, make sure to grease them and flour them. And yes, you can use the rice flour. It works just like the regular flour. Here is a picture of my pot/pan cake pan!
Empty pot after removing the cake. You can see the oil/flour dusting and it worked very well!
4.) Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. And just to remind you again, make sure your pans are oiled and floured. You seriously don’t want any sticking going on. Once you have your pan oiled and floured, pour half the batter into whatever small pan you are using. Bake the cake for 20 minutes or until it’s lightly golden on top and a toothpick comes out clean when stuck in the middle of the cake. Repeat the process with the second half of the batter and don’t forget to re-oil the pan and lightly flour it!
First finished cake!
5.) Allow both cakes to cool completely.
(Icing)
2 cups Non-fat Plain Yogurt
1/2-3/4 cup of Natural Peanut Butter (No added sugar, salt, or oil)
3 tablespoons of Rice Flour
1.) Mix all ingredients with a mixer. Whip them together until smooth, thick, and creamy.
Should look something like this when finished.
Take a knife and saw off some of the cake top, to make it flat. Take 4 pieces of parchment paper and lay then in a circle on a plate. Place the cake in the middle of the circle.
Spread a thin layer of icing in between the two cakes.Then frost the sides of the cake and the top of the cake. Just thin enough to cover the cake. Not to thick. After you are done frosting the cake, slowly remove each piece of the parchment paper from under the cake. Just slowly pull them out. This technique leaves you with a clean plate without icing smeared everywhere!
Top of cake!
If you want to pipe letters on the top of your cake, take some carob chips and melt them in the microwave. 20 seconds at a time. You want them just melted enough to stir nicely. Then take some of the Yogurt Icing and mix in the melted carob chips. Make sure the mixture is nice and cool. You can stash it in the freezer for a couple of minutes to firm it up if needed. Place the Carob Icing in a plastic sandwich bag and snip of a tiny part of the bottom corner of the bag. You are now ready to write on your cake! (PROTIP: Take a toothpick and spell out the words on the cake by dragging the toothpick through the icing. This way you can practice what you want to write and smooth it over if you mess up!)
We are ready to party!
And of course, photo’s of the Birthday Boy with his cake!
He of course LOVED his cake!
I hope that wasn’t to complicated to follow! If you have any questions about the process or the recipe, leave a comment and I will do my best to help you out!
XOXO,
Jen
I am playing around with dog friendly Biscotti biscuits. So today I made the first batch of biscotti using rice flour! It turned out very well. It doesn’t take that many ingredients to make and all ingredients are healthy for dogs. This first one that I made is a Peanut Butter and Carob Chip Biscotti. Who doesn’t like a chocolate (fake!) and peanut butter flavor?!
So in this cookie, we use Carob Chips instead of Chocolate Chips because chocolate is of course toxic to dogs because it contains Theobromine. Because dogs process the chemical Theobromine slowly, it can become toxic rather quickly. In the early stages, theobromine can be treated successfully. But depending on the size of your dog and the amount of chocolate that is consumed, it’s very important to take action fast because the build up of the chemical can become deadly. Some of the symptoms for early poisoning can include the following: hyperactive, slow heart rate, and dehydration. The more serious complications from a lethal dose of chocolate are: seizures and in some cases death. So if you suspect ingestion of chocolate, get your dog to the vet immediately. And make sure to keep chocolate in safe places where dogs can’t access it. Also be careful when baking and cooking with chocolate, that nothing falls on the floor.
Carob Chips, however, are safe for dogs since they don’t contain the natural theobromine chemical. Carob chips are made from an edible legume from the Carob Tree. The taste can be quite similar to chocolate but has a nutty flavor and is a little on the bitter side. You can find Carob chips in any health food store or section in your local grocery store.
So here are some photos from my first test batch of doggie biscotti!
Getting ready to mix the dough!
Finished product!
Up close photo to show texture.
The rice flour lends a sort of flakiness to the finished product. Overall, I am quite satisfied with the turn out. The boys of course LOVED them. They smell delicious. No added sugar, salt, or real chocolate! All natural peanut butter (ingredient list of ONLY peanuts!) and organic rice flour. The babies are wheat free, egg free, and dairy free. The carob chips DO contain some soy in them but only a small amount of chips are used and don’t pose a risk of any kind…..just stating this in case you have a dog that is allergic to soy!
I will be making some more types of biscotti and I will post those as soon as I get those recipes nailed down. But as of right now, the Peanut Butter and Carob chip ones will eventually be on the cookies for sale list because they turned out so well! So look forward to treating your doggies with some amazingly yummy treats!
XOXO,
Jen
