Healthy Dog Treats: Low Fat Carrot Dog Treats Recipe
Is your favorite furry friend starting to get a little chunky? As much as I love to make dog treats for my dog, he loves to eat them even more! Sometimes I believe that he thinks that he’s at an all-you-can-eat buffet.
When my Black Lab’s vet told me that Sam needed to shed a few, I decided to find some dog treat recipes that would not only be yummy, but keep his weight down too. No need for my baby to feel deprived. 
Here’s a healthy dog treat recipe that fits the bill:
Low Fat Carrot Dog Treats
Ingredients:
1 med. banana (ripe, please)
1 c. shredded carrots*
1/4 c. unsweetened applejuice
1/8 c. water (maybe more, as needed)
1 1/2 c. whole wheat flour (keep some handy for rolling)
1 c. rolled oats
Directions:
Start off by preheating your oven to 350 degrees, lightly spraying a baking sheet with nonstick cooking spray and sprinkling a little flour onto the surface your’re planning to use to roll out the dough.
In a medium bowl, mash up the banana and mix in the shredded carrots. To the carrot and banana, add the water and applesauce. Stir. Next, add the water and applesauce. Stir all of the ingredients together until they are thoroughly combined.
Using your hands, knead the mixture until a dough forms. Dump the dough onto the lightly floured surface that you prepared earlier. Roll it out until it’s about a half inch thick. Using a cookie cutter (bone shapes are fun!) or the rim of a small glass, cut into 3″ pieces. Place the pieces onto your lightly sprayed baking sheet.
Bake the dog treats for 25 minutes.
Before “serving”, let them cool completely. Here’s a tip that you may find useful: If your dog likes a little more crunch to his treats, then turn off the oven and let the treats cool there overnight.
This recipe makes about 24 low fat, healthy dog treats. My dog can eat them up pretty quickly, but they’ll actually last about 3 weeks, if stored in the fridge and up to 6 months, if you decide to freeze them.
*About the shredded carrots…I like to buy mine already shredded in the grocery, but if you do the shredding yourself, you should keep the skin on. That’ll add an extra nutritional punch to the recipe. Regardless of whether or not you buy them shredded or do them yourself, give the shredded carrots a rough chop before adding them to the recipe. The treats will come out better if they’re a little bit smaller.
Related Posts:
do you us apple sauce or juice? ingrediants say apple juice but the directions state apple sauce which one do I use
This Carrot treat is just what I want. Is it applejuice or applesuce? I have used applesauce to reduce oil and eleminate anything “sugary”. When my bannana is ripe
I will be making these treats for sure!
Thanks
Hey this is a great recipe my dogs love these… but it doesnt give a measurement for the apple sauce….i just kind of added what i thought might be appropriate…. good luck
I tried this recipe except my Great Dane and my Weimie have a sweet tooth so I roasted the banana in a 350° oven for 20 minutes with the skin on (the skin turned absolutely black but that’s okay) and then skinned it and let it cool before using it. Made it sweeter with no extra calories and they seemed to absolutely love it.
Should that be applesauce in list of ingredients? I have used applesauce with success to replace oil so I am guessing – My banana is ripe so I am good to go now – I am excited about a treat with less calories – I use them in training and really have to watch the “intake”. Will give forward the critic’s review:-)
Sorry about the double posting of my question – comment. I have now made these – used applesauce thinned with apple juice and needed very little water. The first warm from the oven reviews are very positive! I have left all but the “tasters” in the cooling oven for the night. I have one dog barking in the middle of the kitchen facing the oven- I do need to add he is not too hard to please if he thinks something is “cooking for him”. We’ll see how they are received after refrigeration – that is the real test. I am very happy to have something that is not high calorie and still healthy for training and treating.
I have now made these more than once – very popular with my pups and have past the taste test of a couple of others know to be picky. I love that I have a treat I can use freely for training etc and not feel like I am adding excessive and/or empty calories or other junk. I have added green beans when short on carrots – subbed some barley flour, even made without bananna (increased applesauce) all changes to fit ingredients “in inventory” all worked fine. Thanks!
Not sure how I feel about reading this article on article marketing. Very nice point. Site contains some really cool stuff about article marketing.
Ummm, what?