Update: I wrote this when Quijote was on a restricted diet and having a treats he could eat was a game changer! We are now introducing his regular foods back into his diet and will see how he does.

Since we adopted Quijote, he’s had stomach issues on and off that vets couldn’t quite pinpoint the cause of.

After a recent bout, a different vet scanned his history with fresh eyes. She had a theory about acid reflux and pancreatitis and I’m a little fuzzy on the details, but, for the first time, we had a plan.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that said plan involves at least a few months of exclusively feeding him that expensive vet-prescribed food — there’s a kibble (which he’s not that into) and canned food (which seems to mostly be for making the kibble more palatable).

And it means all of his treats are currently off the menu. Which is kind of a big deal for him, as well as us. Because, before this, I think our treat game was on point. We had treats for training, for nightly teeth cleaning (his favorites!), for hiding pills, for stuffing into a Kong to keep him distracted when we went out for coffee or over to my parents’ house for dinner… you get the idea.

A week or two into what he must think of as The Great Treat Famine of 2019, I asked the vet for suggestions. She said there’s a way you can actually bake the canned food to give it a more solid, treat-like texture! She was a little fuzzy on the details of how to do it, but I was like “don’t worry. This is definitely a thing the internet has the answer to.”

It had several answers, actually. A lot of them recommended techniques I couldn’t make sense of until I tried them out myself. I used tips from various recipes, especially one I found on Dog Treat Kitchen – plus some trial-and-error.

DIY Dog Food Treats

Method 1: Freeze

Before I get into how to bake treats, I’ll share a shortcut I stumbled on in the process: freezing them.

How to:

You just dollop some treat-size bits of canned food onto parchment paper or into ice cube trays and put it in the freezer.

That’s it.

Notes:

• Quijote has his own designated ice cube tray.
• Best for at-home treats, since they don’t travel particularly well. (They thaw almost immediately.)
• Not good for hiding pills.
• Takes slightly more time to chew up than the baked treats- which is usually a plus.
• I freeze some in strips that are approximately the size and shape of the dental treats he loves. He doesn’t get as excited, but what we call his “fake dental treats” are still a couple steps above regular food (even though I haven’t added anything).

If you’re looking for something more portable or less cold, read on.

Method 2: Bake

To summarize: yes, you can DIY dog treats from canned dog food.

• Put bits of wet food on a cookie sheet.
• Bake at 350F/180C for 15 minutes or until they’ve reached your desired consistency.

What Recipes Say + What Works

Because making treats is kind of an off-label use for dog food, it’s not as easy to work with as cookie dough or something meant for baking. So there are all kinds of weird tips that go along with the recipes.

1. The Slide 

Recipes recommend: Slide all the food out of the can in one solid cylinder (like its cranberry sauce at my great grandma’s house on Thanksgiving).

Things I did:

• Tried unsuccessfully to slide the food out of the top of the can.
• Used a church key can opener on the bottom of the can, in case that helped. (It didn’t.)
• Made a big mess.

What worked?

• Giving up on the sliding-out business!
• Using a butter knife to dig maybe a third (or so) of the food out of the can at once and then pack it together into kind of a rectangular patty before slicing it up.

2. The Slice

Recipes recommend: Slice your cylinder (or patty) of food up with the edge of the lid.

Things I did:

• Sliced with the edge of the lid.
• Sliced with a butter knife.
• Scooped out little dollops with a spoon like it was cookie dough.

What worked?

• Technically, they all work – but not equally well.
• Slicing it into little squares with a butter knife was the quickest, cleanest, and easiest way I tried.
• I didn’t find an advantage to using the lid.
• My first attempt was the little cookie dollops. The wet food doesn’t hold together or shape very well, though, and I think I ended up with as much stuck to my hands as actually on the baking sheet.

3. The Bake
Recipes recommend: Baking for 30 minutes.

Things I did:

• Used the toaster oven set to “bake,” instead of the full oven.
• Various baking times.
• Foil and parchment paper.
• 350F/180C

What worked?

• The toaster oven has worked great for the small batches of treats I make!
• I flip them halfway through with a fork or popsicle stick.
• 30 minutes seemed like an insanely long bake time for such small treats, but it turns out that’s about right – approximately 15 minutes on each side for small (finger tip size) squares.
• Bake time will depend on how large you make your treats and how crispy you want them to end up.
• Using parchment paper for lining the baking sheet. I found the treats would stick to foil, even after being baked.

Some tips:

• Crispy treats seem to last longer outside of the fridge. Softer treats are better to hide pills in.
• The canned food I’ve been experimenting with is Royal Canin GI Low Fat – other types may give you different results. (If so, please comment and tell me about it!) This is in no way an ad/endorsement/recommendation for that brand. Honestly, the jury is still out on how well it’s working. It’s just what Quijote’s vet wants him eating while we try to narrow down the cause of his tummy troubles.

At the end of the day, you just have to figure out what works best for you and your pup.