Homemade Dog Treats

I saw this recipe a while ago over on Vicki's Healthy Eats and Sinful Treats, but just never got around to making them for my sweet little pup. Given that she is in recovery this weekend, and I feel like she needs all the extra spoiling she can get, I decided that today was the day to make these.

Michael and I were discussing the ingredients and thought, hey, these might not even taste half bad for humans.

Wrong. They are nast-yyy. No sugar or butter = not good at all for human tastebuds.

But Tess? Tessa loves them. Loves them in an I-will-wrestle-that-cookie-out-of-your-hands-before-it-even-hits-the-floor kind of way. We were going to share some of them with other doggie friends, but quite honestly, I'm not sure if Tess will let a single one of them leave the house.

So all of you mutts out there... you may be out of luck. Sorry.

You roll them out like cutout cookies. I used a dog bone cookie cutter, but because those are pretty big and Tessa is pretty small, I decided to do some smaller shapes as well. So I mixed in some little hearts and stars, too. They all turned out really cute.

Peanut Butter Dog Treats

(Source: ivillage.com)

Ingredients:

- 1 1/4 cup milk

- 1 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter

- 2 cups whole wheat flour

- 1 cup all-purpose flour

- 1 1/4 tbsp. baking powder

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Combine flours and baking powder in large bowl.

3. Mix milk and peanut butter in large bowl, until smooth. (I used my KitchenAid mixer.)

4. Gradually stir flour mixture into wet ingredients.

5. Knead dough by hand, adding small amounts of milk if mixture is too dry. (Again, I used my KA mixer for this, with the dough hook attachment.)

6. Roll out dough onto lightly floured surface to desired thickness and cut out treats with cookie cutter of choice.

7. Bake on cookie sheet for 12-15 minutes, modifying timing for dough thickness and treat size. (Mine were probably rolled to about 1/8" - 1/4" thick, and 12 minutes was the perfect time for all of them. The little hearts and stars took the same amount of time as the bigger bones. Just watch them closely.)

They rise a lot during baking, but they do not "spread" very much, so you don't have to worry about leaving a lot of space between them on the cookie sheets. The consistency of them when they are done is like a cross between a cookie and a biscuit.