Banana Kibble Kong

Have leftover bananas that are just too ripe to normally eat? Then share them with your dog while making them work for their tasty treat.

Once those bananas get a little too ripe for us here at the Lab Brats house, we give them to the dogs. Now, normally Dakota would swallow the banana whole so I began putting the banana in a Kong and freezing it so they have to work to get their treat.

Banana Kibble Kong Recipe

1 Medium Banana (mushed)
1 Cup of Dog Food
1 Kong

Layer the kibble and banana until you run out of both. The layer should begin with kibble as to keep the banana from coming out of the small hole on the one end of the kibble and end with the banana on top to keep everything in place. Push a dog biscuit in the top layer of banana so that it is sticking out just enough for the dog to grab. Freeze for 4 hours or more with the small end down.

How long it lasts depends on the dog and size of the Kong. We have the Extreme Large Black Kongs and this treat will last anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour.

Great idea for when:
1) Your dog is bored
2) It is impossible to go outside
3) You are crating your dog for a long period of time
4) You are leaving the house and your dog has separation anxiety
5) Its your pup's birthday
6) You just feel like giving them a treat!

Enjoy! :)

Homemade Dog Treats

What Labs can turn down free dog treats?

When we received an email from a woman that was working to break into the homemade dog treat scene, our doggy ears perked up. All she wanted to do was send us some free samples of her dog cookies and get our feedback. Well, the Lab Brats don't just reply to an email, we bark it out to the entire blog community! *laugh*

Conni's Pampered Pooch (http://www.connispamperedpooch.com) is a home based business where Connie herself makes all her own dog treats with natural ingredients and by hand. There are no fancy contraptions in Connie's kitchen; just love!

The amount of care and love she puts into her products is obvious. Upon opening the bag, the Lab Brats automatically smelled the doggy goodness and Cheyenne was climbing on the counter to get a closer "look" even though I didn't open the box fully. The little brat actually grabbed the bag of Beef-N-Cheddar biscuits from the counter and tried to run away with it! Not to worry, with one "drop it" command, the bag was released from the Jaws of Life and equally shared between both dogs.

So, what do we think about Conni's Pampered Pooch dog treats? The Lab Brats love them! We received free samples of both the Beef-N-Cheddar as well as Apples-N-Cinnamon. Although they loved both and woofed down even last morsel, the Beef was definitely more a hit in our house.

Awesome doggy cookies Connie! Keep up the great work!

Food Recipes for Your Dog

With all the hype about the dog and cat food recalls, someone dropped us a tip on a great site that lists a number of dog food and treats that any dog lover can make at home: Food Recipes for Your Dog.

We haven't had a chance for either of the Lab Brats to try them out but they seem to be very nutritious and safer for your pets then some of the alternatives. A number of the recipes call for all purpose flour but I would recommend changing that out for wheat flour as the latter has more nutritional value. Too bad neither of our Labradors have a birthday coming up because they would love the Birthday Cake for Pups!

Enjoy!