Rehydrating Freeze Dried Food for Dogs and Cats
Freeze dried food is the fastest growing segment in the natural pet food market. Questions about rehydrating freeze dried food for dogs and cats are frequent at Goodness for Pets. Watch this short demonstration for techniques and options for rehydrating freeze dried food for dogs and cats. The demo will be using products from Primal Pet Foods and Stella and Chewy’s. Remember: Think beyond water!
Transcribed from Video
With the growing popularity of freeze-dried foods for dogs and cats, we get a lot of questions from our customers at Goodness for Pets about how to rehydrate the food. So, we are going to demonstrate the options and techniques for rehydrating.
The freeze-drying process removes all the moisture from the raw food, rendering it shelf stable and very convenient. At serving time, the food needs to be rehydrated to ensure your pet is getting adequate amounts of moisture. The technique I am about to demonstrate works for both dogs and cats.
There are many options for rehydrating beyond water, which is the most common fluid used. I prefer to rehydrate with something that provides additional benefits such a protein or calcium. Some options are goat’s milk, wet food in either cans, tubs or pouches and bone broth. All contain significant moisture and can be used to rehydrate the freeze-dried food. The goat’s milk is a natural source of probiotic for digestive health. High quality wet food is an appetite enhancer and provides additional protein. Bone broth is also a great source of protein and fiber as well as calcium.
Today I am going to demonstrate how to rehydrate using bone broth. This bone broth from Primal Pet Foods comes frozen and is available in 4 flavors, chicken beef turkey and pork.
In this bowl you see how the broth looks before heating. A lot of fiber due to the vegetables the broth was made with. This bowl has been heated. You can see it is clear and soup like.
The general guideline is to rehydrate with 1 tablespoon of fluid for every ounce of freeze-dried food. I have crumbled 2 ounces of freeze-dried food into small pieces and this bowl contains 2 ounces of bone broth. Pour the broth into the bowl and then spread the food on top. By making the pieces smaller, it speeds up the rehydration. Stir it up so all the pieces touch the broth. And you are done!
Please feel free to contact us if you have any further questions about rehydrating freeze dried food. Our contact information is available on our website www.goodnessforpets.com