Kitchen Scraps You can Safely Give to Your Dog as Special Treats

Most people make sure they dogs are being fed a healthy well-balanced diet to suit their ages whether they're on dry or wet food. Some owners like to feed their pets a home-made diet, but it can take time and it's a bit messy to prepare. Other people choose to go down the dehydrated or freeze-dried pet food route, which offers the same nutritional value as feeding a home-made raw food diet. However, you can spice up your dog’s regular food without them getting an upset tummy, read on to find out how.

Many canine nutritionists now think it's best to rotate a dog's diet so that it's more interesting and varied. The problem being that many dogs suffer an upset tummy when their food is changed too much, so the solution is to add some healthy home-made ingredients to your dog's regular food to make their diets more interesting for them. Below are a few suggestions of foods you can safely add to your dog's meal on a regular basis which should not give them an upset tummy and the good news is most of the foods will cost you nothing because they’re left-overs!

Healthy Kitchen Scraps You can Safely Feed Your Dog

If you enjoy a baked potato every now and again, but never eat the skins usually throwing them away in the bin, think about adding a little of the skin to your dog's dinner. As long as the potato skins are well cooked and fed in moderation to our canine friends, they are safe to give them offering a new and enjoyable taste to their meals. The bonus being that potato skins are quite rich in many vitamins even when cooked.

Wintertime sees lots of families adding root vegetables to their meals which includes lots of healthy and delicious carrots. If you buy fresh carrots you'll need to peel them and rather than throw all the peels away, consider adding some to your dog's meal. They will love the taste with the added bonus that carrots are full of goodness which includes fibre, Vitamins A, C, B and K and they contain lots of potassium. Adding some carrot peelings to your dog dish makes their meal more interesting and as long as you don't add too much, there's little risk of your dog ploughing on the pounds because of the extra calories.

Sweet potato is another really healthy treat you can add to your dog's meal every now and again to make their diet more varied and interesting without the worry of causing them to suffer an upset tummy. This yummy veg is full of goodness which includes beta-carotene and Vitamin A. However, you need to make sure you don't give your pet any sweet potato scraps with butter on them!

Spinach is full of goodness and it's safe for you to add any “left-overs” to your dog's dish. They will love the taste and enjoy the fact there's something in their usual food. You can also give them any left-over lettuce which is actually high in protein with very few calories in sight! Lettuce is also rich in calcium, Vitamins C, A and the B-vitamins as well as containing lots of valuable and essential minerals, all of which is very good and safe for your canine companion to eat.

In fact, dogs can safely eat lots of vegetable left-overs that many people throw in the bin which is a bit of a waste. Your dog would really enjoy many of the things that don't get eaten and as long as they don't have any salt, butter or anything else on them, your pet will benefit from the goodness they contain and they'll really enjoy all the new flavours you add to their regular meals. Cooked vegetables you can safely add to their dinner include the following:

Asparagus – steamed, boiled, grilled or baked. The only things to avoid giving your dog are the stringy and fibrous stems and any bits that are soaked in butter or other sauces. Asparagus is rich is so many things and most dogs love the taste.

Broccoli – baked, boiled or steamed dogs like the taste of this vegetable with the added bonus being it is full of vitamins and minerals as well as providing a good source of fibre. As with everything, it's best to add a little broccoli to your dog's dinner never overdoing things too much.

Green beans – tinned, cooked or frozen are all delicious to our canine friends with the added bonus of this vegetable being very low in calories. When the weather is very hot, a frozen green bean or two will go down very well as a special cooling treat for your pet.

Peas – shelled and cooked are safe to add to your dog's dinner, so no need to throw any left-overs in the bin. However, you have to make sure the peas don't have too much salt, gravy or butter on them when you give them to your dog. Peas are a very good source of fibre and folate protein. Just a few peas added to your dog's food will do them a lot of good and it saves you throwing them in the bin!

Pumpkin – cooked it’s an excellent veg to give to dogs so if you have any left-overs from the kitchen, rather than throw them away, add a little to your dog's food and they will love the taste. However, again it's important the pumpkin has not been spiced up or that it’s had too much butter added to it which could mean your dog's calorie intake sky rockets through the roof! Pumpkin mixed with rice is a great remedy for an upset tummy in dogs because it calms their digestive systems down which helps stop the “runs”.