I think I mentioned in another thread that once I became a pet-owning adult, I started off feeding what I THOUGHT at the time was the best (Science Diet), which I now consider to be garbage.
About 10 years ago, as I became more informed about the need for appropriate and wholesome nutrition, I transitioned completely to a homemade raw diet. Bought a meat grinder, would grind up the bones and organ meet, as well as the muscle meat, added less than 10% ground veggies, and added supplements. I did that for about three or four years. The dogs did REALLY well on it and loved it... but the day-long process to grind it all up (not to mention the clean up of the ENTIRE kitchen and rust-control for the grinder's metal pieces) every two months or so just became unmanageable. I found out about "The Honest Kitchen" during that time, and started using their base (Preference) mix, as well as their Kindly (another base) mix. The dogs still loved it, and I loved that I knew it was balanced nutrition.
Ultimately, I started rotating in The Honest Kitchen's grain-free, meat-inclusive recipes (I alternate between the Beef, Turkey, and White Fish). The dogs love it just as much as the raw, and they maintained all their outward signs of vastly improved (as opposed to kibble-fed) health, with the exception being their poops are slightly larger and not chalky white like the poop is when raw-fed (which isn't a concern for me, at all).
I DO continue to rotate between a meat-ball-sized portion of ground raw beef, chicken, or turkey (and blend it into the fully re-hydrated food from The Honest Kitchen), as well as weekly rotating portions of canned sardines, organic pumpkin, raw egg, salmon oil, and a mussel or two. I typically will completely rinse any leftover meat portions from our human meals (rinsing to remove seasonings, sauces, gravy, etc.) and dice them up to mix into the following day's meal, as well. Finally, I add The Honest Kitchen's "Perfect Form" and
Proden PlaqueOff Dental Care for Dogs and Cats into each serving.
I order The Honest Kitchen through Amazon's Subscribe n Save service (along with a bunch of household items and toiletries), and save 15% on it's pricing.
Finally, just recently, I decided to rotate in the occasional bag of Sojo's beef and chicken formulas into my Amazon Subscribe n Save. Really, that was more for me than the dogs... haha... they honestly both love and thrive on everything as described above, but I just feel better about providing them with a rotation of flavors and textures, plus I think that the variety hopefully adds to their overall health. As far as the food is concerned, I think Sojo's and The Honest Kitchen are fairly comparable, but I REALLY appreciate and value The Honest Kitchen's transparency, overall vision about caring for both our furkids and the planet, sustainability, securing actual, real, honest-to-goodness HUMAN GRADE (FDA Approved!) quality ingredients, and that it's made in human-grade manufacturing facilities.
Regarding dehydrated food in general: I typically spend about 7 minutes prepping my dogs' food each day, as described above. Additionally, I've found that overall, my dogs don't totally digest the rehydrated vegetable chunk matter as much as I'd like them to (for example, carrots or celery passes through their digestive system and is visible in their stool), so for all of the brands, I use a large-capacity spice/coffee grinder and blend up the dry food before I rehydrate it. Again... probably overkill on my part, but I want ALL their food to be as digestible as possible.
Finally, in terms of the original question of this thread: Do I believe it's worth it?
HECK yeah! (and I'd use more colorfully-emphatic terms, if this wasn't a family-friendly forum...ha) My dogs energy levels, their playfulness, their breath, their teeth, their skin and coat... Truly, phenomenal. Just the other day, a dog-loving friend of mine (who feeds what he feels is a high-quality kibble) was scrunching his fingers into our little Blue Merle Girl's luxurious coat, and he asked how often we bathe her. I said she hasn't had a bath in about 45 days (I also bathe my dogs myself, but she just hasn't needed one)... and he was astonished at how she didn't "smell" like dog. He even commented that despite really massaging her fur all the way to the roots, he didn't get any of the dog-smelling, waxy/powdery build up that he gets when he just casually pats his (much shorter-haired, obviously) Labrador Retriever. Our little Sheltie girl's coat remains sweet smelling and doesn't have a hint of doggie-ness to it. I attribute that almost entirely to nutrition (along with weekly brushings, of course).
Anyhoo.... Proper food and species-appropriate nutrition REALLY is a passion of mine, and to me, feeding The Honest Kitchen (and Sojos) with the fresh supplements I use both represent the highest of quality foods available coupled with the greatest convenience for the best nutrition I can give my fur-kids. I already posted about it in another forum, but if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend checking out the new documentary, "PET FOOleD" (on Amazon
here or iTunes
here).
Really sorry for how long this post is... haha.... but Dog Food is probably my FAVORITE topic ever!!!... Don't get me started in real life, lol... I'll talk your ear off!
Best to all!
Darin
