Thursday, November 19, 2009

Sweet Potato dog biscuits, and people food

My two dogs - big Otter and little Maya - are big fans of home-made dog biscuits. Many dog treats include stuff that reminds me why I went vegan in the first place, like "animal digest." That kind of blew my mind when I first saw it, but it's a common ingredient in many products.

There are lots of good companies that make vegan and vegetarian dog treats, but they can be a little pricey. My standby solution is a peanut butter biscuit recipe, but this time I used half sweet potato and half peanut butter. It was an experiment - Otter and Maya love their peanut butter, but they gave these sweet potato biscuits two paws up.

Here's the recipe, really easy with a food processor:
2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
1/4 cup ground flax seeds
1/2 cup natural peanut butter (or 1/2 cup roasted sweet potato, or a 1/4 cup of each)
1 1/2 tbsp. molasses (optional...I'm out of molasses too)
3 tbsp. canola oil
1 cup liquid, more or less (I use half non-dairy milk, and half water)

1. Combine everything except the water-milk mixture in food processor, and process until fine and crumbly. Keeping it running, add the liquid little by little, just until the biscuit dough balls together and no longer sticks to the sides of the bowl.

2. Roll dough out until it's about a half inch thick, and cut with your favorite cookie cutter. I bake these at 375 F for about 25 minutes, flipping all of the biscuits halfway through so they brown on both sides.

Readers without companion animals may not be with me any longer, but if you stuck around, here's some people food. A couple of Isa recipes, from Vegan Brunch and Vegan With a Vengeance, plus my first experiment with sourdough bread.

The VB omelette recipe always makes me happy, here stuffed with spinach, mushrooms, and Tofutti mozzarella slices. Tofu and chickpea flour, with some seasonings, and you'll never miss eggs again.

Here's a plate of Jerk Seitan, from VwaV, along with coconut-lime rice. Still one of my favorite recipes from VwaV.

Making sourdough starter is cool, just because it's fun to do things you're not supposed to do, like letting food sit around and ferment for a few days. This sourdough rye is from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Holy tofu...Mikey that really looked like an omelet!

Otter and Maya are lucky to have their own doggie biscuits! Now that's a REAL treat!

Stop cooking so fabulously...okay I didn't mean that...cook away genius! Inspire the rest of us minions. hehehe

KarenZ said...

Awe, the VB omelet. What a great recipe! Love the blog.

River - The Crafty Kook said...

Both the doggie treats and the people food look awesome! Is it wrong that I want to eat one of those little dog biscuits? Probably! :-)

My mother in law has a little Chihuahua mix that would love these, especially the sweet potato version because he is coo coo for sweet potatoes!

I don't miss eggs, but your omelette sure makes me miss tofu! Oh the cravings!

Trinity (of haiku tofu) said...

I'm going to make those treats for my pups over Thanksgiving break. Also, your omelet looks awesome.

Theresa said...

Aw, two paws up! Cute image in my head!

That omelet looks amazing, as does the bread. I've always wanted to try baking sourdough bread...

Sal - AlienOnToast said...

i keep meaning to make that jerk seitan. i've only ever cheated and bought a ready made paste before!

Unknown said...

your sweet potato dog biscuits are so cute! what a great idea for your pups :)

Anonymous said...

Just found your blog...great pics and recipes. The food looks great! Love to hear that someone else likes to make treats for their doggies. With all your cooking talents, PLEASE open up a vegan restaurant here in Fargo. I bet you would have quite the following. There are plenty of vegetarians and vegans in the Fargo area to support a small cafe. Happy Holidays!

Unknown said...

Sweet potato is a highly nutritious and an alternative for food for their valuable contents of carbohydrate, protein and carotene, which are necessary for normal development and even for the sexual development too, believe it or not. Sweet potato is really helpful for welfare and our body.

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Anonymous said...

I plan to make the dog biscuits as gifts for my dog owner friends who need nothing for themselves but will appreciate a homemade gift for the pooches.

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