Less Impact Cats eat homemade food
This is the amount of waste we have been generating each week to feed our cats since they came to live with us in December of last year. 21 BPA-lined cans to be recycled, as well as a cardboard case covered in plastic wrap. The cans never made it to my tally. While I avoid canned foods for us because of the BPA issue, I don’t include them in the tally because it’s impossible to separate out the weight of metal vs. plastic. Still, regardless of the plastic lining, this is a lot of waste. Yes, the cans can be recycled. But imagine how much energy could be saved if we could avoid the cans altogether!
(Our cats could never tolerate dry food.)
So, I went in search of homemade cat food recipes. I found all kinds of conflicting opinions. There are those who insist cats must eat raw meat to be healthy. And there are those who feel that cooked meat and grains are fine. Not wanting to short-change my pets, I called the Nutrition Clinic at the U.C. Davis Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital. They create custom homemade diets for pets. Unfortunately, not until they are over 1-year old.
Well, the time has come. The kitties had their 1-year birthday a couple of weeks ago. So I tried again. Success. The nutritionist referred me to the BalanceIT website. You fill out a quick questionnaire for each animal (they create diets for dogs as well) reporting its gender, weight, neuter-status, etc. and then select a protein source and a starch source from drop-down menus. The computer does the rest. I chose chicken, and knowing that my cats used to have digestive problems any time they were fed grains, chose sweet potato as the starch.
(See 12/21/09 Update at the end of this post)
Here are the ingredients in our recipe (without amounts, since every animal has different needs):
cooked white chicken meat
cooked mashed sweet potato
butter
Balance It supplement
I ordered the supplement (unfortunately, it’s not sold in stores), and it arrived the next day. Here is what the ingredients look like:
Weekly waste will be 1 waxed paper butter wrapper. Bi-monthly waste will be the plastic supplement container. And the occasional shipping box. If I order more than one bottle at a time, I’ll cut down on even that.
The biggest challenge was figuring out how to buy the chicken without plastic. First, I took my stainless steal canister to Berkeley Bowl and asked that my chicken be placed directly into the container without plastic or paper. The response was, “No. We’re not allowed to do that.” “Okay,” I said, “I’ll put everything back and shop elsewhere.” And I did. I returned the bread and butter I’d already picked up and headed to Whole Foods.
Whole Foods was a little more expensive. But the butcher didn’t bat an eye when I asked him to put my chicken in the canister. And he had no problem first deducting the weight of the container. I carried everything home in my bike basket and got to work.
I boiled the chicken and baked the yams. (Yes, they’re yams instead of sweet potatoes. I think it’s okay.) Next time, I will probably cook the yams in the microwave to speed up the process. Then, I put the ingredients in my food processor in batches and mixed it up.
Finally, I used old plastic containers (yogurt, etc.) that we still had in the house to divide up the food into 7 days. (I’m thinking storing the food in Polypropylene is healthier than the BPA in which their commercial food was packed.) To each container, I mixed in 2 scoops of supplement (2 scoops for 2 cats.) I may try adding nutritional yeast (the blue container in the photo) next time and see if it helps with fleas. Forgot to do it this time. Anyone have experience giving yeast to cats?
Not sure how long the fresh food would keep, we put 3 containers in the refrigerator and 4 in the freezer.
And the big question: What do Soots and Arya think?
They go crazy for this stuff. They love it. They whine and cry and beg for more. (Yes, Arya is back wearing the plastic cone after having the metal rod removed from her leg last week.)
I know there are quite a few cat owners who read this blog and may have ideas and suggestions. Please fire away. I’d love to hear what you think.
12/21/09 Update: The cats are bigger now, of course, so the proportions have changed. I won’t give you amounts, since to get the recipe right, you really need to enter your pet’s information at petdiets.com.
We have also changed some ingredients in the interest of simplicity.
- Instead of chicken, we feed them ground dark meat turkey, which we buy in the same stainless steel pot from the Whole Foods meat counter.
- Instead of boiling the meat, we bake it in the oven at the same time we are baking the yams.
- Instead of adding butter (since dark meat has more fat than white meat anyway) we just add turkey drippings back to the recipe.
- We never did use the yeast.
- We don’t don’t need to use the food processor anymore since we have the butcher grind the meat for us.
- We store daily portions in the Anchor glass refrigerator containers I wrote about early this year. We keep two containers in the refrigerator and the rest in the freezer.
The kitties still love their homemade food!
I was think8ng a good idea with avoiding the waste of the butter wrapper would be to make your own butter which I love doing, you can buy cream in glass pitcher containers which can be reused and it will cost less to make it homemade ☺
Useful article for homemade cat foods.
Hi. Yams have a lower glycemic number if they are boiled. I fed my cats the frozen cat patties from pet store. They were100% ground baby chicks. Natural raw diet and no mess. Just the a patty. My cats also love sweet potato. I give them organic sweet potato baby food once in a while. Cats are 100% carnivores do watch the starches. Sweet potatoes are better then grains.
It lasts about 2 months for 2 cats.
this little bottle of balance it cost over 50 dollars probably with shipping is 60 dollars. that is expensive imo. How long does this bottle last for you. how many scoops do you get out of it ? i have 4 cats.. grown cats, wonder how long will it last for me. Any guesses by anybody that has experience with this bottle of BalanceIT
Yes, have given my kitten yeast. Once gave her a tad too much and you knew it in the end. Be careful with amounts. Esp with babies.
Hi where do I get the supplement
How long can I freeze this
It would depend on whether you are freezing it in airtight containers or not. Our glass containers are not airtight. We only freeze it for up to two weeks at a time. It should last much longer in an airtight container (like one of these, for example. Scroll down for the airtight stainless option: http://myplasticfreelife.com/2008/09/plastic-free-in-freezer-airtight/ ). Just how long, I don’t know. We make it every two weeks and use it up in that time.
RE pet foods. You need to be sure the food is balanced for your pet. Cats have an obligate taurine & higher protein requirements than dogs, & unless you’re using the BalanceIt supplement & a cat-specific recipe (ration), your cat will not be getting all of the nutrients it needs. The Honest Kitchen has a freeze-dried (reconstitute with H2O) set of pet food options that comes in a cardboard box w/ a plastic liner. Don’t mess around with making up your own cat food recipes w/o nutritional guidance from a veterinary nutritionist (there aren’t any out there in general practice, so that’s the reason BalanceIt.com exists).
I am a veterinarian & I rarely recommend many of the common, popular foods or even rx foods, unless there are very specific medical issues.
We DO use the BalanceIt supplement to ensure they get all their required nutrients. After 9 years on this diet, our cats are still very healthy and their coats are beautiful. Our vet is very impressed.
Where do you get the supplement? Butter is ok for cats? I thought they are lactose intolerant? Butter agrees with them? Why do you add yams? I don’t think my cats would go for that. Thanks for an awesome blog post! I look forward to hearing back from you.
I am undergoing a similar journey and I’m starting with removing the plastic from my life, but don’t intend to end there. I also have cats, so thank you for posting this!
I use little Corning glass containers with heavy plastic lids that do not touch the food. When I first mix it up, I put it in a similar larger container.
I’m disappointed at the rude comments people have posted. I guess pet food choices are a hot button issue! My vet strongly recommends against any added vegetable matter whatsoever, so BalanceIt doesn’t work for me, which is a bummer. I did try to use their free recipe maker just to check it out, but you can’t choose more than one or two dietary limitations or else you get a message essentially saying they can’t make a recipe to meet your pet’s needs. I chose low carb and low fiber: no deal. That’s ok. Time to seek other options!
It does work – click on Autobalancer EZ (under Homemade Food) and just click on which meat you want to use and then click “Done”. The recipe that comes up on the left hand side says “Result: Passed”; that means that is the recipe that you would use. Then you click on “Adjust to your Cat for Free” to put in your cat’s weight (or use dog column for dogs) then click at bottom and recipe will come up on right hand of screen. Then click “View”. You would use their Carnivore Blend for the recipe as that’s the one that’s made for no carb meals.
@Rhiannon TruthTeller7788 Exactly. We live in the city and have indoor cats. They need the supplements.
@Aamina1 Hi. I should update this post because we still cook the yams in the oven, not the microwave. That said, we do still use a microwave to reheat foods or heat water because the microwave is much more energy efficient for small quantities of food.
http://sierraclub.typepad.com/greenlife/2012/09/microwave-or-stove-whats-efficient.html
We bought our microwave secondhand from someone on Craigslist.
I know there is concern about microwave radiation leaking and microwave cooking changing the molecular structure of the food. But any kind of heating changes the molecular structure. So far, I haven’t seen enough evidence that microwave cooking is harmful, and I do think it’s important to reduce the amount of fossil fuels we use. (Our stove is natural gas, by the way.)
@Jen Sorry, I thought I had answered. It’s very hard to keep track of over 900 posts! Yes, they still eat it, and yes, they are still healthy!
Sunstreaker Hi. I’m not a vet, so I can’t really answer your question about diarrhea. There’s not really gravy.
Oh, and I didn’t mention that the pet food deli offers a discount for returning the plastic 5-lb tubs which they refill and reuse many times – limited plastic waste!
A great option that is available where I live (Minneapolis-St Paul) is a local ‘pet food deli’, where they sell cooked and raw ground meat in 1-, 2-, or 5-lb containers. Options are with or without organs and bones, with or without supplements, and local free-range meats. While I won’t take sides on the supplement/raw debate, my veterinarian (who is NOT holistic) only stressed the importance of organs and bones in a whole meat diet. She did not suggest supplements, or disapprove of a raw diet. Perhaps this is indicative of a growing trend. However, our cats also eat some dry and canned food, so they are getting nutritional supplements in that form. Overall, they are very healthy and happy, with beautiful shiny fur. They love their raw meats, but they also love dry and canned food. I think what they enjoy the most is variety – having something different all the time.
In my opinion, a much more important issue than the raw pet food debate is the idea of vegan cats. Yes, it really exists. https://veganpet.com.au/articles/
Briana
Nice article! Love your plastic free values. Wonder why you still use a microwave though?
Hi. I should update this post because we still cook the yams in the oven, not the microwave. That said, we do still use a microwave to reheat foods or heat water because the microwave is much more energy efficient for small quantities of food.
http://sierraclub.typepad.com/greenlife/2012/09/microwave-or-stove-whats-efficient.html
We bought our microwave secondhand from someone on Craigslist.
I know there is concern about microwave radiation leaking and microwave cooking changing the molecular structure of the food. But any kind of heating changes the molecular structure. So far, I haven’t seen enough evidence that microwave cooking is harmful, and I do think it’s important to reduce the amount of fossil fuel we use. (Our stove is natural gas, by the way.)
TruthTeller7788 Even people who feed raw add supplements such as taurine, vitamin B, vitamin E, calcium and salt. Just feeding meat would not be sufficient as it lacks certain nutrients. For example, the phosphorus and calcium ratio has to be balanced. Meat is very high in phosphorus but lacks calcium so if you fed meat without calcium, the diet would be deficient and the cat would become ill. Taurine is also extremely important; even though it’s naturally in meat, people always add more to make sure the cat is getting enough as a deficiency can cause heart failure.
If you’re talking about the fact that they should live on mice, sure, that would be great but it’s impractical, not all cats live outside and have a steady supply.
I’ve been using nutritional yeast in my cats’ food for two summers now- they are indoor/outdoor during the warmer months. In these two summers, I have not used commercial flea prevention, nor has it seemed my cats have needed it. Their diet is currently EVO wet one large can gets one tablespoon of nutritional yeast. (Though after reading this article today, I am going to do some price checking to see what the cost difference in making their food would be!)
thetotalcatstore ok I checked out your site and the premix is pretty simple BUT you are pushing a RAW diet and many RAW advocates would tell you that your method is WRONG too! Using ground and NO BONES is a no-no to some hardcore groups. It doesn’t matter that the mix emulates whole prey. So you see, you’re method isn’t perfect either yet you chose this way. There is nothing wrong with the posted method either. Leave it at that.
thetotalcatstore really pushing that site aye? Listen…..RAW is not the ONLY way to feed. Its like the difference between being a ovo-lacto-vegetarian and a vegan. Nuance and personal choice. Not everyone can spend hundreds on a proper meat grinder. This solution is an option to commercial pet food and is easily accessible to the average person without having to handle the raw diet. I feed raw to one of my dogs. He does fine but it is also messy. I feed prepared to another because he will not touch raw. Raw people have to stop pushing their agenda so hard. It really turns people off.
Beth,
Just wanted to give you a heads up regarding Balance It supplement ingredients being revised a bit as of this month. It says that if you have a recipe from somewhere else which you do, you need to contact the place you got the recipe from and see if the amount you use in the recipe needs to be changed. Here’s the link:
(see 3/18/13 Important Notice):
https://secure.balanceit.com/marketplace2.2/details.php?i=7&cc=
Thanks. I’ll update the post so it doesn’t give any specific amounts. People should use the recipe generator on the site to figure out the amounts. I’ll have to check and see if this applies to the bottles we already have or just those we purchase in the future.
That’s a good idea. I contacted petdiets and they said the amount of supplement would change and gave me the new amount. The new bottles say on them that 1 red scoop = 2.32 g.
I found out today too that I was using the wrong amount. According to my recipe from petdiets it says to add one red scoop of balanceit and that will equal 4 g. But I was looking at my bottle today and it said that one red scoop equals 5.3 g. So I’ve been adding too much. Will have to contact petdiets again and see if that was ok. I wonder if balanceit changed the amount in their red scoop from 4 g to 5.3 g in the past so if you had an old recipe from petdiets you would never know to change the amount.
Beth,
How do you heat it up after you take it out of the fridge? I know you can’t use the microwave because it’ll destroy the vitamins so do you just let it sit until it warms up or do you use warm water, etc?
Thanks.
Hi. You’re right, I don’t microwave it. I add some warm water to it, which helps to warm the food and gives them extra liquid in their diet. Also, my cats don’t mind eating cool/cold food.
Thanks Beth, I’ll try the warm water and see if my cats like that – if they don’t find it warm enough, guess I’ll start adding the supplement after warming up in microwave instead of before. I must say your cats are the most laid back, unfussiest cats I’ve heard of. They’ll eat anything and don’t mind chilly food; you are so lucky
Beth, I apologize!! My goodness, I must reread my posts before I press post. I meant to say that I contacted balanceit and that site gave me the recipe with the higher carb amount. Then I posted before I got my recipe from petdiets. I just got it and it is a better recipe in my opinion as it’s lower in sweet potato than the one from bi and higher in chicken. So again, sorry about that post!
Beth, contacted them both – your recipe is way lower in carb and higher in chicken than the recipes they gave me; not sure if you changed it on your own or not but you might want to check with them if you did to see if that’s ok in the long run as changing ingredient amounts changes the nutrrient profile. So if they’re getting extra meat, than they’re getting extra phosphorus and the phosphorus:calcium ratio could be off, amongst other things.
Thanks Beth. I’m going to contact Pet Diets and inquire about a dark meat/sweet potato recipe; the recipe I currently have is one that I got from the Balance It site and it uses chicken breast. I think it would be easier to use dark as you can get it already ground and, of course, I wouldn’t use oil if they’re fattier. I didn’t know though that thighs are lower in protein than breasts, I will inquire about that.
Hi Beth, I just contacted Balance It and asked them if I could use dark chicken meat instead of chicken breast and omit the oil but they said that typically you can’t substitute ground chicken for chicken breast as chicken thigh is much fattier and has much less protein. So I’m wondering why it was okay for you to use dark turkey meat instead of chicken breast?
Hi, Rhiannon. That was a decision we made on our own, and our cats seem to be very healthy on it. But I haven’t done a lab analysis, so I can’t guarantee that it’s perfect. I just know that our cats don’t get sick (unless they eat plastic!) Their coats are very shiny and they are sturdy beasts. Muscle-bound, even. 🙂
Hi. I think you should probably check with an expert on which one to choose. Since I’m not a veterinarian, I can only tell you what we do and what works for our cats. But I can’t advise for yours. 🙂
Hi. I appreciate this opinion but also recognize that there are varying opinions all over the web and what to feed our pets will depend on various factors including where we live and what kind of lifestyle we have. In a day or so, I will post an update. Our cats have been eating this diet for 5 years and are beautiful, shiny, and healthy. It works for us.
Hi everyone, I was just reading thru the blogs. Its great that we are all trying to eliminate all the extra trash but keep in mind the nutritional needs for your felines. They are obligated carnivores. No grains or carbs should be in their diet. I feed a homemade raw diet. NOT COOKED. Their body needs the enzymes from the raw meat in order to utilized the nutrients. Cook food has never been a natural diet for your felines. Raw is the answer. Ive been doing for over 5 years now and which great success and many health aliments improved. Like CRF. To assure you have a balance raw diet there are suppliments you must add. The raw diet should mimic that of a natural prey they would have caught, like a mouse, which is the staple of a wild felines diet. I use the TC Feline Premix. We sell this on at our store TheTotalCat.com.
I want to try this as I go through tons of cans per week too – I went to the balance it site but they have 2 different supplements – one that you add meat and a carb to and one that you just add meat to so it’s a bit hard to decide which one to get.
I would sugg only using one that uses meat. Cats do NOT need carbs. Matter of fact that normally cause obsity and health issue. Cat are obligated carnivores, meaning they really only need meat in their diet. But to provide a balance meal, you need to add suppliments to any meat we buy to give. I use tc feline premix. There two versions one with and without liver. I use the with liver version so I only add meat , the premix and water. Its simple. Check it out on thetotalcat.com
How to make you own RAW CAT FOOD and be assured it’s a balanced meal. Try TC Feline Premix at TheTotalCat(dot com). A premix with over 17 years success of selling to feline households and a 14 year feed trail. Visit TheTotalCat(dot com)
don’t know if you are still feeding cats this way four years later. We got kittens this year (2012) and have been feeding raw meat pieces. Cats and dogs do not need or use vegetable matter and do better with raw, but not ground, meat. Look up raw feeding or whole prey model feeding. I have learned so much and my cats love it and look and act great. Just give ’em appropriately sized pieces of a variety of meats with just a little organ and bone and they thrive.
I buy from grocery stores but will look into your suggestions to find other ways to reduce the plastic that comes with buying meat.
Hi Torie. We do still feed them this way and they are shiny and healthy and happy. Whether to feed raw or cooked is a personal decision, but no matter which way you feed your cats, it’s great to reduce as much packaging as possible. I hope you can find a butcher shop that will let you bring your own container!
@kathybailey Hi Kathy. I actually need to update this post. We bake the yams or sweet potatoes in the oven now. I think we only used the microwave a couple of times.
My dog has severe allergies and has been eating homemade food for several months now! Pork, Pinto Beans and Pumpkin for one meal and Fish and Sweet Potatoes for the second. For snacks we like frozen bananas, apple slices and cut up carrots.
It’s a lot of work to prepare, but I use the oven and crockpot as much as possible! After cooking, I use canning jars in single servings amount but don’t mix the ingredients. I think it last longer and I just buy when I get low of one or two items. I keep about 4 of each in the fridge and the rest in the freezer.
I’m now growing my own pumpkins and hope to plant sweet potatoes soon! I’m new to the concept of plastic free, but have been removing plastic from the kitchen as far as food storage. I buy the food in the largest container I can find.
Thanks for all the great advice on this site!!
Hi Andrea. Actually, nowadays, we buy ground turkey, so we don’t have to blend or food process it.
My son has a farm and his cats never get “store bought” food.
Instead he feeds them chicken parts when he cleans his free-range chickens. He also feeds them rice but at least half of their diet must be hunted on the farm.
He gets the females fixed and regularly adopts.
He doesn’t have too many cats or rats!
I make dog treats but not dog food. My dog is very jealous of your cats!
Lucky cats. What struck me is how you considered the carbon trail left by your lovely companions and actually doing something about it.
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Thanks for letting me know, MB. I just fixed the link. Be aware that you will still have a plastic BalanceIT container to recycle, but it will be a lot less waste than all those cans.
delighted to see this post (i got here through one of your more current posts about the containers, but the kitty food is what i was most interested in!) the link to the petdiets calculator isn’t working, any chance it needs to be updated? i would love to start doing this for my kitty, the cans from her food are the only thing i put in the recycling bin now, and i’m ready to just cancel my curbside altogether…
I think it’s wonderful that you keep from wasting so much plastic! However, it seems odd that part of the reason you do this is health reasons, yet you use a microwave??
We’ve been making our kitty-food for a couple of years, using the Feline Instincts supplement powder (raw organic turkey and chicken livers is the meat we add) — originally to help a beloved kitty with some health problems. We strive to keep our plastic use way down, and like you, Beth, our kitty needs are one place that has been difficult. I just watched your TED talk (bravo!), and it never occurred to me just ASK the Feline Instincts folk to change their packaging. Doh! I’ll be writing them later today.
Thanks for all you do in your life — it inspires me to keep going with reduce, recycle, re-use. We generate very little garbage compared to many, but I know we can do better — thanks for helping me look at “what else?”
Half of my cats’ diets are mice… they’re pretty fierce hunters… I figure that’s completely natural and healthy… maybe I can convince them to catch more wild food.
Back in the 50’s, my mother occasionally fed our cat raw beef kidney’s…chopped up. It was astounding how much he loved them. He behaved like a cat on catnip.
I’ve heard that cats need a little bit of organ meat in there too(about 5% of the meat should be liver or heart.) I wonder if the vitamin mix takes care of it so it’s not needed.
I have such a finicky cat, it would be great if this worked for her. Did you need to heat it up before feeding or could you serve cold from the fridge?
Kylyssa, your kitty is beautiful! Looks like our. And I totally know what you mean. I am so in love with Soots these days, I think I may neglect Michael because of him. If only Michael would grow more fur…
Following up —
It does appear that the cost of homemade is a bit more than canned, but not much more. We have been buying pretty expensive cat food. Compared to Friskies it would be way more expensive. I’ll try and do a real cost comparison at some point.
We just found another local butcher — at Star Grocery on Claremont — that is happy to grind up the chicken for us and put it in our container. His chicken costs a bit less than Whole Foods, too. Having the chicken pre-ground will make this process even easier.
Regarding the supplement — it supposedly contains all the vitamins and minerals that the cats need in powder form. It might be healthier to buy more ingredients and feed them even more naturally, but it’s not really practical for me or most people. Buying the chicken and cooking it and the sweet potatoes and mixing the dividing it all up is already more than I even do for Michael and me!
There are other options for starch — rice, pasta, etc. — that people can choose. Rice would probably be easier than sweet potato for those with a rice cooker. It’s just that our cats have never been able to tolerate any types of grain. It gives one of them the runs.
Surprisingly, the kitties took to the new diet extremely well and had no digestive problems with the switch at all. We really didn’t wean them off the old stuff much at all. They LOVE the new food, and we have the scratches to prove it, as they sometimes get a little over-excited when they realize it’s meal time.
Regarding what I said about BPA-lined cans vs. Polypropylene — just this week a lab in Canada discovered chemicals leaching from PP (#5 plastic) which has long been considered one of the safest plastics! Here’s the link (thanks to MamaBird for bringing it to my attention via Twitter)