Homemade dog food for senior dogs: recipes and rules

You can feed an older dog a homemade diet, but only a complete and balanced recipe is safe as their everyday food. Meat, rice and vegetables on their own are not a complete diet. Over months they leave a dog short of calcium and several other nutrients. The safe way to cook for a senior dog is to follow a recipe written for your dog by a board-certified veterinary nutritionist, including the supplements it lists.

This page explains the rules: what every home-cooked recipe has to contain, what a sound recipe looks like, and where older dogs differ. It does not print measured recipes or supplement amounts.

Why there are no measured recipes on this page

When veterinary nutritionists have analyzed homemade dog food recipes from books and websites, most were short of at least one essential nutrient, and many were short of several.

A recipe is also only right for the dog it was written for. The amounts depend on your dog's weight, body condition, activity, bloodwork and medicines. The supplement amounts matter most, because too little and too much can both cause harm. That is why this site gives no quantities.

What every homemade recipe needs

A complete recipe has six parts. Leave one out and the diet stops being balanced.

What proportions of protein, carbohydrate, fat and calcium?

There is no single ratio that makes a recipe balanced, although many websites offer one. Nutritionists work out how much of each nutrient the dog needs for the calories it eats, then choose ingredients and amounts that reach those targets.

Some general principles do hold for a healthy older dog:

• Protein stays generous. Older dogs lose muscle more easily, so a healthy senior generally needs plenty of good-quality protein, not less. Reduced protein is for specific diseases and is a vet's decision.
• Carbohydrate and fat set the calories. A less active senior usually needs fewer calories, so recipes for older dogs are often leaner. A thin, frail dog may need the opposite.
• Fat has to be the right kind. Dogs need certain fatty acids that meat fat alone may not provide, which is why recipes name a specific oil.
• Calcium is not optional. Meat is rich in phosphorus and poor in calcium. A dog fed meat and grains without added calcium draws calcium from their own bones to make up the difference.

The supplements a home diet needs to be complete

Calcium, zinc, copper, choline and vitamins D and E are among the nutrients most often found short in home-cooked recipes. Ordinary ingredients do not supply enough of them in amounts a dog would eat, so a supplement is part of the recipe, not an extra.

What is the best multivitamin for a senior dog on a homemade diet?

The one your dog's recipe was designed around. There is no best product in general, for three reasons:

• Ordinary dog multivitamin chews are made to top up a dog already eating a complete commercial food. Most do not contain nearly enough calcium or minerals to balance a home-cooked diet.
• Supplements made specifically for balancing homemade dog food do exist. Each is meant to be used with recipes built for that product, in the amount the recipe states.
• Human multivitamins are not a substitute. The levels of vitamin D, iron and other nutrients are set for people, and some chewable or gummy products contain xylitol, which is toxic to dogs. Do not give one unless your vet has confirmed the exact product and amount.

The amount of any supplement depends on your dog's weight, age, kidneys, liver and other medicines, so it is set by the nutritionist or vet who wrote the recipe. More is not safer. Vitamin D and calcium in particular are harmful in excess.

What a balanced recipe looks like

These two outlines show the shape of a typical recipe for a healthy older dog. They are illustrations, not diets. The amounts are left out on purpose, and guessing them is how home-cooked diets go wrong. A nutritionist fills them in for your dog.

Chicken and rice base

• Skinless chicken, cooked through, with no bones
• White rice, cooked soft
• Carrots and green beans, steamed and chopped small
• A measured amount of a named vegetable oil, and often fish oil
• A calcium supplement
• A vitamin and mineral supplement for home-cooked diets

Beef and sweet potato base

• Lean ground beef, browned and drained
• Sweet potato, peeled and cooked until soft
• Squash or peas, cooked
• The same oil, calcium and vitamin and mineral lines as above

The method is much the same for both. Cook the meat thoroughly with no salt or seasoning. Cook the starch and vegetables until soft. Weigh out each ingredient as the recipe states and mix well, so your dog cannot pick out the parts they like. Supplements usually go in once the food has cooled, as the recipe directs.

How much homemade food to feed

There is no reliable amount by body weight, because a cup of one recipe can hold far more calories than a cup of another. A properly formulated recipe comes with a daily amount in weight for your dog. Use a kitchen scale, not a scoop.

Then weigh your dog every couple of weeks at first. If weight drifts up or down, tell whoever wrote the recipe so they can adjust it. See weight management for senior pets for how to judge body condition.

Kitchen rules for making dog food for an old dog

• Follow the recipe exactly. Swapping chicken thigh for breast, brown rice for white or one oil for another changes the nutrients. Ask before substituting, and never drop the supplement.
• Cook meat, fish and eggs through. Raw diets carry bacteria that are a bigger risk for older dogs and for older or unwell people in the house.
• No cooked bones. They splinter and can block or tear the gut.
• No seasoning. No salt, stock cubes, gravy, onion or garlic.
• Store it safely. Refrigerate what you will use in the next few days and freeze the rest in meal-sized portions.

These foods are never ingredients: onions, garlic, leeks and chives in any form, grapes, raisins, chocolate, macadamia nuts, anything sweetened with xylitol, alcohol and raw yeast dough. Our guide to which vegetables dogs can eat covers the produce side.

When home cooking needs a veterinary nutritionist

Always, if the food is going to be your dog's whole diet. It matters most when an older dog has a medical condition, because the diet becomes part of the treatment and a general recipe can make the disease worse.

• Kidney disease. Phosphorus and protein have to be controlled against bloodwork that changes over time. See what to feed a dog with kidney disease.
• Pancreatitis. Fat has to be kept low and consistent, and a single rich meal can set off a flare. See pancreatitis in senior dogs.
• Liver disease. Protein type and amount, and minerals such as copper, may need adjusting.
• Heart disease, diabetes and bladder stones. Sodium, carbohydrate and mineral levels each need managing.

Your vet can refer you to a board-certified veterinary nutritionist, and many work remotely alongside your own clinic. Expect them to ask for your dog's records and recent bloodwork, and to want rechecks. Your vet will set the schedule.

If you want to cook but not formulate a whole diet

There is a middle path that suits many households. Feed a complete and balanced commercial food as the base and add a small amount of plain home-cooked food on top: a little cooked lean meat, some vegetables, a spoonful of rice. Vets commonly advise keeping extras like these to about a tenth of the day's calories, so the main food still does the balancing. If your dog is on a prescription diet, ask your vet before adding anything to it. Our guide to choosing a senior dog food covers picking that base.

Plain chicken and rice for a few days, on your vet's advice after a stomach upset, is a different thing again. It is a short-term measure, not a diet. A dog kept on it for weeks is being underfed in several nutrients.

If you are cooking because your dog has gone off their usual food, look for the cause first. See why an old dog stops eating, and the senior pet nutrition guide for the wider picture.

When to call the vet today

• Your dog has eaten nothing for more than 24 hours, or much less than normal for several days.
• Repeated vomiting or diarrhea, blood in either, or black, tarry stools.
• A painful, hunched belly, especially after a fatty meal.
• Weight or muscle loss, a dull coat or new weakness in a dog on a homemade diet.
• Lameness, bone pain or a fracture after a minor knock in a dog who has been on home-cooked food for a long time.
• Your dog may have eaten onion, garlic, grapes, raisins, chocolate, macadamia nuts, xylitol, cooked bones or a human supplement. Call your vet or an animal poison control line now, without waiting for signs.
• A swollen, tight belly, retching without bringing anything up, or collapse. Go to an emergency clinic at once.

This article is general educational information about home-cooked diets for older dogs, not veterinary or nutritional advice. It intentionally gives no measured recipes, feeding amounts or supplement doses, and the recipe outlines above are illustrations that should not be fed by guesswork. A homemade diet for your dog, and above all for a dog with kidney, liver, pancreatic or other disease, should be formulated by a board-certified veterinary nutritionist working with your veterinarian.