Homecooking - does it need to be complicated ?

I guess we COULD do the conversion to find the dry weight of what we're feeding and then try to compare to the AAFCO values - I've actually been thinking of doing that - has anyone tried it ? It would be a true test of mathematic skills ! LOL

 
Yup, I've done it
 
Add up the total grams of protein, fat, carbs, fiber, calcium and phosphorus (convert these minerals to grams by dividing #mg by 1000) in your homecooked diet.  Now add the up the total amount of g of food by weight.
The difference is your moisture content. 
 
Then you have to figure out the %s.  I learned my method in algebra and it would probably confuse the heck out of peopl "IS over OF equlals % over 100"   There are easier ways to do it. 
 
This calulates on an as fed basis.  For dry matter, you just Use the weight of the fat, protein, carb, fiber , Ca and Ph without the weight of the moisture as 100% of your total recipe and do the % math from there. 
 
If you want to compare it with kibble, do the math as if your recipe had 10% moisture. 
I am horrible at explaining this stuff, but it is doable and I am no math major.

I pay attention to the NRC values but am not a slave to them. You really might be more comfortable having the assistance of a nutritionalist. They will take into account what you can find/afford etc. And, I was thinking about this the other day. It does seem that it's easier to feed large dogs than small. That's just my opinion, but would be interested in other people's views.

My rescue boy came to me at age 3 with brittle rust colored hair, dull grey haze over his pretty brown eyes, brown teeth, loose stools, and horrible bad breath.
 
After 2 years on mostly Nature Variety raw, some homecooked and no kibble, I realized the bad breath is gone!   The other sypmtoms cleared up (hair is soft glossy black and gold) his after about 6 months but the bad breath reamined for over a year.  2 vets said his teeth were fine even got whiter from chewing on bones.  I just realized his breath is fine when I took him him to have his tooth checked.
 
When I did try to give him some kibble every now and then, he'd get diarrehea.  
So I can attest to it.  Plus he acts like the puppy he never got to be. 
 
 

Yeah, I did the conversions to AAFCO this morning (totally insane !) - then I realized that the AAFCO ranges for nutrients were so ridiculously large that I stopped the conversion after 2 recipes.   By that time I was confident that the NRC numbers would always fall in the AAFCO ranges, and since AAFCO ranges are what's used for commercial foods I felt I couldn't possibly do worse.  It WOULD be interesting to get the complete nutrient listings off of some of the better commercial foods to see how my recipes compare.
 
I wouldn't say I'm a "slave" to the NRC numbers, but I do try to get close to ensure no major excesses or deficiencies.  
 
Hollysmom - not to burst your bubble, but Prancers "body odor" and bad breath, as well as her horrible tear stains all went away when I switched her to a better commercial food, so I think its the better ingredients and lack of artificial additives (dyes, and whatever else they throw into the food mix) that helps.   I'm happy to say that none of those things returned with the switch to homecooking (not that I expected them to).

I think Nature's Variety raw is a great food. Unfortunately, two of my three won't eat raw, and I can't afford that for all three anyway.

My apologies for the delay in answering.  My original recipe I did come up with myself based on suggestions from others who were on the forum at the time.  As I recall, the only real change she made was the addition of brown rice, in minimal amounts, which I've since stopped using, and a bit of an increase in the calcium.  Oh, and she did put everything at EXACT amounts...which since I don't measure for us humans, I basically disregarded after the first few batches. X number of cups of sweet taters pretty much adds up to 2-3 medium.......
 
I upped the meat and added in eggs to increase the protein and did run that by her and got a thumbs up.
 
I raised two kids, feed a diabetic hubby with issues not only with that, but also cholestrol and high BP AND the belly fat (they were calling it Syndrome X, not sure what it's called now) and pretty well keep everything controlled with diet, so I think I can feed my dogs without worrying too much about exact amounts of trace minerals.  Yes, I did have guidance in both from a nutritionalist, human and canine respectively, but, gosh darn, it is NOT rocket science.  It WAS a bit intimidating trying to balance the good and bad carbs for hubby with the lower fat, no meat kind of meals to keep the blood sugar stable...and there are so many different schools of thought on carbs and whats ok and not ok....for example legumes are carbs, but being high protein some schools of thot consider them an ok carb......I could make myself nuts!
 
A little common sense goes a very long way.  That and some expert guidance, but again, it is not brain surgery.

Glenda, thanks for the info.  I know you've spent alot of time at this so I value your feedback.   Your recipe has a wide variety of foods, and I think the legumes do an excellent job of providing the trace minerals.   I"m not sure many people actually think of using them for dogs.
No, its not rocket science, but after so many years of "running blind" feeding commercial food its a little intimidating when you realize why all the supplements are needed.    I know most people who homecook use a human supplement - but thats not really practical for a 15 lb dog (how could you break a human vit into 10 pieces LOL), so I think as Stacita said, whats in the food becomes more important ... a few extra mg or a few less mg of this or that when you need only a few to start with can be a big percentage difference between the recommendations and what you actually feed.
One example is general guideline to include 5 - 10% of the diet as organ meat.  If I were to include this amt as beef liver in Prancers meals she'd be getting 4-8x the amount of retinol (preformed vitamin A), and 2-3x the amt of copper she needs.  I have to wonder if that's just too much.  As it turns out I include 2-3% of her meals as liver - that's all she needs to meet the copper, iron and retinol requirements according to the NRC guidelines.
 
 

JoAnneDe- I can tell that you have really been doing your homework!!! Way to go! 
 
I think it is harder to balance a small dog's diet and we need to be extra careful.  Too much vitamin A and copper can be a very bad thing and many eople wouldn't have noticed that.

JoAnne,
 

  One example is general guideline to include 5 - 10% of the diet as organ meat.  If I were to include this amt as beef liver in Prancers meals she'd be getting 4-8x the amount of retinol (preformed vitamin A), and 2-3x the amt of copper she needs.

 
 
This is exactly what I thought this past weekend when doing organ meat for the first time.  I am guilty of quoting this amount - that I felt secure about- b/c I got it from k9 nutrition group. 
 
I think I am going to send off a question to them about this, and I was already thinking of starting another topic about just this.
 
So, I looked at Chelsea's spreadsheet and looked at the amount in the multi, and would you believe that I only added 1% of liver.  It was beef liver, and I did notice on the nutrition data site how much more Vit A beef liver has than chicken liver.  
 
So, when I get some time, I'm going to shoot off a question about this 5-10% ratio - but it will likely be a few days.
 
But, honestly, you have a much better understanding of what the liver really has in it b/c I didn't even consider the copper issue.   I think you are on that list too, so if you want to send of a question about this before I get around to it, then please do.  
 
What I am now thinking is maybe 3-4% is liver, and 3-4% is kidney, and they are assuming the use of chicken liver since it's lower in Vit A (don't know about the other stuff).  But, if that's the case, it should be stated as such, b/c if someone ended up doing 7-8% of beef liver, then whoaaaa.  This difference really needs to be understood and explained better. 

I belong to both the K9 Nutrition and the K9 Kitchen groups.  Personally I'm more comfortable with Monica Segal's methods for formulating homecooked, and have found that its not all that difficult to come up with decently balanced recipes.  I don't fret every mg of every nutrient but I do try to keep them within reasonable ranges.
You're absolutely right about there being hugh differences between beef liver, chicken liver, and kidney and if you went all one way or the other as your organ meat you'd end up way high or way low in some nutrients.  Hence why I like using my spreadsheet - it keeps ME balanced and keeps me from making assumptions.
 
From a "common sense" perspective we could have gotten things better by using a greater variety (ie: all three organ meats mentioned above), but as I said at some point above, one man's "common sense" might not be another's.  

ORIGINAL: glenmar

I will admit that I've been a bit intimidated by some of the recent posts about all the detail.  Then I remind myself that I DID have my recipe approved and tweaked by a canine nutritionalist.

A note here, heart is NOT an organ....it's a muscle meat despite being an organ in the body.

My dogs have eaten the same basic diet, with changes in veggies, the tiny bit of fruit that I use, I vary the protein source, but my carb source remains constant with sweet taters.....for THREE years now and they have great coats, great muscles, skin, etc, etc, etc, and their blood work is perfect.

Do you mind sharing your recipe please?

Thanks!