Sharing the Love

When two passions collide, it’s a wonderful feeling. In my case, my two adorable Great Danes and my passion for baking have come together in Gigi’s kitchen. Despite their slobber and loveable goofiness, Odin and Winston are a delight to have around. However, their grocery bill can be quite high due to their size and appetite. Though we don’t give them many treats, when we do, we make sure they are of high quality. Unfortunately, premium dog treats can be expensive, so I decided to try a simple recipe for homemade dog treats.

Doggo Approved

Seriously, how can I refuse these polite pooches anything?

Anything to do with peanut butter or banana and my guys are all in. Winston is not at all discriminate when it comes to snacks, Odin, however, is my fussy boy. He was seriously fussy, and turned his nose to hot dogs when we tried using them for training. Whipped cream in a can is his kryptonite, like Samson after a haircut, he is powerless. So if you have a picky pup you need to train, try a squirt, it’s like the Dog Whisperer in a can.

Fortunately, these dogs are not sensitive to grains, if yours are you may need to find an alternative to whole wheat flour. Some good alternatives, according to Google are almond, oat, and brown rice flour. I had excess whole wheat flour milled by a local farm that I needed to use. After searching the web I decided on a simple recipe by Princess Pinky Girl. Simple and quick to make, I had everything on hand, thank you Princess Pinky Girl!

Enough to Share

These boys are big, Odin weighed in at 153 pounds a few weeks ago, I know what a poor little undersized boy. Winston is a bit shorter with a very large head and ears, classic european dane, and much easier to train. Generally, when he learns something he remembers and will be on his best behavior, other than when coming across barking, off leash dogs. We have had some unfortunate run ins with aggressive dogs in the woods. He likes other dogs, as long as they aren’t coming out of nowhere barking like mad at his humans.

I have doubled the recipe for these dog treats, with two big boys they won’t last long. Using a small heart-shaped cookie cutter to make treats that are about 1 1/2 inches wide, perfect for the dogs to nibble on. Additionally, I made some bigger treats with a three-inch bone-shaped cookie cutter that looks so adorable. We are planning to bring a nice little gift bag for Granger, who is an adorable pooch belonging to my sister-in-law’s friend. Granger is much smaller and has a lot more energy, and the one time I met her, I felt an instant love for her. If you’re wondering, yes, Granger as in Hermione Granger, sigh.

Quick and Easy

These treats come together in under an hour with basic ingredients you will likely have in your pantry already. There aren’t too many tricks to this recipe other than mashing the banana really good or you will have chunks in your dough. Normally this would be a good thing, banana bread is a good example. The issue here is you want your dough uniformly coming together so when you cut the treats they stay in one piece and bake up nice.

I used a silicone non stick mat I have for rolling out fondant, rather than flouring my countertop. This mat is worth the $10 for projects like this or with cookie recipes you don’t want to add too much flour to. This recipe is a bit dry and I was worried adding more flour wasn’t the best choice. I also used Silpat mats to line my cookie sheets, the treats came right off with no effort at all.

Doggo Approved

My pups are not allowed in the kitchen when we are cooking, they are big boys and we trained them young to stay out to avoid injury. That said, when I was putting these together they were sitting in the dining room drooling, yes it is just as gross as you are imagining. My Swiffer Wet Jet does not get put away, we use it so often that I bought washable pads rather than continuing to fill the landfill with the disposable ones.

Once these were cool enough I gave my boys one each and they gobbled them down, even Odin endorsed their yumminess. When we first brought Odin home we got into the habit of rewarding him with a small snack each time he would come in from the fenced in yard when called. Now they expect treats every time they come inside, so there is a treat jar with small – very small treats right by the sliders to the yard.

I realized they were going outside a lot yesterday after making these. It finally made sense, they wanted more of these treats! So I started breaking the hearts in half so they didn’t have too many, these guys are too smart! I hope your pups enjoy these simple dog treats as much as my boys do!

I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post.

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.