Bone Broth and Your Diabetic Dog

Today we talk about a “superfood”, bone broth. We have all heard about how good it is for us humans; well the good news is that it’s really good for our pups too! For those of you that have a picky eater or one that just isn’t “feeling their food” in the morning, this may be the miracle for you! Let’s talk about the benefits for both you and your pup.

What can bone broth do for you and your pup?

• Provides nutrients – Bone broth is a great source of protein and minerals and can bolster the immune system not just in pups that aren’t feeling well, but in all pups. If your pup has been sick or is just a picky eater, you may want to try adding some bone broth to his/her meals to entice them to eat. It is packed with great flavor and I haven’t heard of too many pups that turn their noses up at it.
• Good for joint support – In the book Deep Nutrition by Dr. Cate Shanahan, she writes “The health of your joints depends upon the health of the collagen in your ligaments, tendons, and on the ends of our bones. Collagens are a large family of biomolecules, which include the glycosaminoglycan; very special molecules that help keep our joints healthy.” Bone broth is packed with glycosaminoglycans. Many of us give our pups supplements containing glucosamine and chondroitin for just this purpose; so adding bone broth to your pup’s meals is a natural addition for joint support. Not only does it contain glucosamine, it also contains other joint compounds like chondroitin and hyaluronic acid. Two other things that you likely have heard of. The beauty of glycosaminoglycans from bone broth is that they are resistant to digestion and are absorbed in their intact form.
• Liver Detox – The liver is the organ in our bodies (our pups too) that is responsible for detoxification. Our pups’ livers are bombarded daily from toxins everywhere, from the rugs that they lay on, walking on grass that has been sprayed with chemicals, de-wormers, flea and tick meds, vaccines, etc. You get the picture. Glycine boosts the liver’s ability to deal with all of these toxins. Bone broth is very rich in glycine.
• Healthy gut – Here is a little physiology lesson on gut health. The lining of the intestine contains millions of tiny hole that allow digested nutrients to enter the body. Stress, poor diet and bacterial overgrowth can cause those millions of tiny holes to increase in size and allow things to pass through that really shouldn’t. The body will recognize those things as intruders and attack them. This is how allergies and food sensitivities develop. It is called “leaky gut”. So somehow we need to plug up those holes to prevent those nasty things from entering our pups’ bodies. How about some gelatin… yup, you guessed it; bone broth is full of gelatin.

Now you have some information on what it does, how do we go about getting some for ourselves and our pups? There are options!!! I make my own bone broth, but I’m not going to lie and tell you that you can just throw a pot on the stove and in 30 minutes it’s done and ready to eat. The reason that it is so good for us is that it takes a long time to make. I cook mine in a crock pot for 24 hours or more. It is very easy to make that way; it just seems to take forever. Some people cook theirs for 48 hours; let’s just say that I’m not that patient.

I use a combination of cooked (from a roaster chicken that I have made for dinner) and raw bones. When I cook a small roaster chicken for soup or dinner, I will either use the carcass immediately or throw it in a Ziploc bag and put it in the freezer until I’m ready to make some broth. I also add some chicken wings that I buy in the grocery store in bulk (these are the raw bones). The more joint bones, the better because you want all of that cartilage to give up all the goodies that we need in our broth. It is often recommended that you can use the chicken feet (ewwwwww) and thankfully, I don’t often see packages of chicken feet in the meat aisle at the grocery store.

I throw all of the bones in the crock pot, (I have a 10 quart crock pot for this purpose) cover them with filtered water (about 2 inches over the bones) and add the organic apple cider vinegar, about ¼ cup for my large pot and set the pot on high for about an hour until the crock pot gets hot. Then I turn it down and slow cook those bones for about 24 hours.

When the time has come, I strain the bones out and anything else that is in the bottom of the pot (do NOT feed the bones to your dog), put the broth in the fridge to cool. Once it is cool, you’ll want to skim the fat off of the top because we all know that fat and diabetic dogs don’t mix. I put my broth in mason jars of various sizes to either freeze or keep in the fridge for up to 4 days. You may notice that your “broth” is more like Jell-O than broth. If that’s the case, you did it perfectly!!! Every batch is different for me. Some are very much like the consistency of Jell-O and some are just like a thick broth. Either way, I just heat it up in the microwave when I’m ready to have a cup. You can even freeze it in ice cube trays and heat it up for your pup’s meals.

There are tons and tons of bone broth recipes on line that you can choose from, just be sure that you aren’t adding anything to it that your pup can’t have. If you are going to buy it in the grocery store, check the ingredients and make sure that there are no onions and no potato type veggies in it. There are some very good alternatives that we can buy for our pups. The Honest Kitchen makes a very good one; it may have turmeric in it so you will need to test your pup to see if his/her numbers are affected by that. You can make beef bone broth also and likely your butcher can save you some bones for that purpose.

As you already know about me, I am a huge fan of going the natural route and having control of what goes into the pot, so I prefer to make it myself so that I know exactly what is in it. Keep in mind that this is not a complete meal but is great to use as a broth if your pup isn’t feeling well or as a “topper” to encourage them to eat.

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Until next time…