Stuffin'

I was looking for some ideas for new things to stuff Kongs with and did a search on the internet. Horrifying! Come on people, there is a reason why your dogs are fat with slipped discs and early onset arthritis and diabetes. A medium sized kong is able to hold a little over an ounce of "stuffing" and if you are loading it up with cheese and peanut butter and dog treats with almost no nutritive value, well... Not meaning to be rough on people but when you choose to be responsible for the well-being of a dog, that means making choices for them that might not be what they would choose, but instead what is best for them.

A bowl of Kongs, ready for stuffing - this looks like a Kong barnacle to me

I did find a couple of ideas that I liked though. For a dog who eats a kibble based diet, here's a way to prolong their breakfast or dinner AND get some extra liquids in their diet for kidney health. Take their kibble and cover it with either water or some low sodium chicken or beef broth. Give it a long time so the kibble plumps up with the liquid to nearly twice its size. Set your kong in a mug or bowl and stuff it full of the water-logged kibble. You can either serve it this way or better yet, freeze the Kong so it takes them longer to completely empty it.

When you want to give your food obsessed dog a treat (and yourself a break) without adding a lot of calories, take a kong and use a little piece of cheese smushed into the small hole at the bottom to plug the hole. Then, put the kong in a mug and fill it with low sodium broth and then freeze for a meaty popsicle.

Finally, an easy, healthy, low calorie kong stuffer is to buy bags of chopped frozen veggies at the grocery store. I like using green beans or peas and carrot, or chopped broccoli. Layer veggies with something like applesauce, plain yogurt or pumpkin and then freeze.

While I know this seems like a lot of work, it really isn't that bad if you stuff several Kongs at once and then just store them in a bag in the freezer.

For some other fun recipes visit http://www.kongcompany.com/recipes/ but be sure to avoid the ones using Kong Pastes since that paste is pretty loaded with chemicals.