Back to the grind

Last night I got back to the grinder.

I chopped up 30lbs of pork hearts (which usually just means splitting them in half) and skinned 5lbs of leg quarters with my new poultry shears from Oxo. I don't think I like the a s much as the Henckels, but if they last longer, then I really can't complain. 

Anyway, prep, grind, packing, labeling, and cleaning the grinder took around an hour and a half. I'm thrilled.

This was the first foray into bones for this machine. Here is the first leg quarter I sent down the chute. All I did was skin it and drop it in. It was glorious.

With my STX, I had to cut a quarter into 3-5 pieces. The only cutting I did on any of these quarters was a notch in between the back and bottom of the thigh on some of them, otherwise, the larger backs got stuck perpendicular at the mouth of the chute. 

So why, you ask, was my hand covering up the output? Let me tell you. When I watched videos of other people using these grinders, they all had their kitchens covered in plastic. I could not figure out what that was about. I've been grinding with my middle of the road grinder for years and I've never needed to plasticize the room.

Yesterday I learned. This thing has so much power, if the meat isn't sufficiently cold (read: almost frozen) or if it backs up and then catches up with itself, it shoots meat out in a most impressive arc. Can you see the splatter on the wall of my bucket?

Now see where River is standing? She's standing there because that's how far it sprayed. She was obviously more than happy to assist with clean-up.

Regardless, I am beyond happy with this thing. The real test will be when I finally do the 40lbs of thighs that are in the freezer.... As it is, I'm running out of containers.

The Nitty Gritty: Where to shop

I wish I could give the dogs all the variety in the world, all organic, all humanely-raised, all fresh, all hormone free... I wish I could feed myself only those things.

When I began this project, I felt a bit like I was only going to do it if I could do it perfectly.

But that's unrealistic. In my opinion, feeding them fresh human grade foods would be better than feeding them processed dry dog foods. If my only choices for my breakfast were "high quality" powdered eggs, or fresh non-organic eggs, well, I'd choose the fresh.

That said, I am always looking for more variety, better sources, higher quality, etc. But I'm not going to feed the dogs something I'm not happy with while I wait for the absolute perfect source to come along, because it may never happen. The fresher it is then the more I know about its origins, and that is always better, in my opinion.

And if you can't find a wide variety of organ meats, as many people can't, I would still do it. We didn't have that wide variety in the beginning. We fed some kibble meals, and we added more vegetables and supplements (like a multivitamin), more eggs. We didn't forego feeding the fresh foods; we made concessions where necessary and continued to look for more sources.

That said, these are the some places to start your shopping spree:

There's that reduced for quick sale
sticker. If it's on sale, and it's a good
price, I'll take it.

The Grocery Store
Yep. The grocery store. My husband now knows whenever we go grocery shopping, we have to make a pass by the meat case, even if we don't need anything, to keep an eye out for the yellow, "reduced for quick sale" sticker. We get pork and beef cuts very cheaply this way, and chicken parts-- bone-in thighs and drumsticks, hearts and gizzards, and livers are the most common items on sale. Sometimes we come across a nice deal on organic chicken or turkey. I'm lucky to have the freezer space to buy anything I see and throw it in the freezer to process later.

When we began making raw, we were buying our chicken leg quarters from the grocery. WalMart here sells bags of leg quarters for $0.59/lb. They aren't the highest quality, as you can imagine, and after removing the large sections of loose skin and removable fat, it's more like $0.75-0.80/lb.

To save processing time, I started buying pre-separated thighs and drumsticks. These had less fat and skin, so the processing time was less, and they were of a higher quality. I could usually get these for around $1/lb, sometimes on sale for $0.88/lb.

I have been told that many people are able to buy cases of certain cuts through the grocery butcher. I've never tried this, as I have a different source for that kind of thing, but it's always worth asking. Most come in 40lb cases, and it's often things that aren't as popular: hearts alone, beef hearts, gizzards, necks, backs, etc. It's always worth asking. Always. 

**One thing to pay attention to when buying human-grade meats is to be aware of "enhancements" and sodium. The less enhancement the better, and I was always told to keep the sodium as close to less than 100mg/4oz as possible. I'll try to find a source on that number...**

Specialty Grocers
Organ meats are hard to come by in most "regular" grocery stores. But we are lucky to have large Asian and Hispanic populations here, and if you're lucky, too, these are great places to find some of these things. So it's worth checking your local carniceria or Asian market.

Cryovacc'd cuts form abattoir, pork
from the grocery store, grinds from
Texas Tripe. It's a mixed bag.

Abattoirs/Butchers
A butcher is a pretty obvious option... But many "butchers" are really just meat stores. And they may be able to order things by the case for you, but the places that actually slaughter and process are the ones to look for. Ask around-- where do the local hunters take their deer for processing? Where do local livestock (especially the small-scale) farmers have their meat processed?

Our local abattoir keeps a large freezer just for cryovacc'd organ and other meats for people like me :) -- kidneys, sweetbreads, testicles, liver, heart, tongue, beef tips. But I can also call them on the days that they slaughter and ask them to hold specific organs for me. I can call and they will bag up lungs, kidney, liver and heart all still connected, and sell it to me for $10. This requires some work on my part, but saves me some money and saves them the trouble of individually trimming and packing. It's a win-win.

Also, ask them what they do with any trim. Tell them what you're doing, what kinds of things you feed, let them know how much elbow grease you're willing to put in (if any), and see what they can do for you. It's always worth asking.

Local Farmers/Farmers Markets
This can definitely be a win-win situation and a phenomenal way to get higher quality sources at a reasonable price.

Who locally sells free-range chicken? Grass-fed beef? Pasture-raised pigs? Other livestock and poultry-- goats, pheasant, turkey, rabbit, lamb?

Give those farmers a call or an email. Explain what you do-- that you're feeding your dogs raw and you're looking for new variety, specifically cuts that might otherwise be going to waste. Things like organ meats that are harder or impossible for them to sell, or things like chicken frames (these are what's left after the legs and breast have been removed from the bird; it's a lot of meat and bone, usually includes the back and neck, and you can add it to other boneless meat to get that 80/10/10 ratio-- and since it's something that they're not going to be selling at the market at a huge premium, they might be willing to sell it for cheap). We now have a couple of local farmers who have their leftover chicken parts-- frames, legs, backs, necks, liver, heart, etc-- ground up and packaged for raw feeders. One has offered to have the abattoir bag up all the leftovers of his livestock for me to buy and pick up. These are humanely and naturally raised animals-- much better quality than I could otherwise afford. But again, it's a win-win. It's always worth asking.

This is even more mixed bag. A box of
beef spleen, cases of hearts and gizzards,
ground packs of chicken frames, blends
including organs, blends from the farmers
market. We buy a pretty wide range
these days

Co-Ops and Similar Group Buying
We don't live in a big enough urban area for utilizing a co-op. DogAware has a list of co-ops by state. This is a way for large groups of people to buy at bulk prices and split the product into smaller quantities.

We HAVE, however, been lucky enough to be able to buy from Texas Tripe. There are other companies like this, you just have to look for them. His prices are worth driving to a drop-off location for us. This is a bit like a co-op. This company deals mainly in grass-fed beef and buys in bulk from local poultry processing facilities and from local hunters. I can buy in bulk, myself (40lb cases of hearts or gizzards, 50lb blocks of chicken frames, 20lb blocks of beef trim, etc.), or I can pay a bit more for him to have already ground and packaged these things; or I can pay a little MORE for him to have already ground and portioned the various components into blends that include meat and organ, and sometimes bone. It's a way for me to buy in bulk, like a co-op, or a less expensive way to buy pre-packaged raw and still have the flexibility to build your own meals as you need to. This is how we've been buying much of our raw for a while now, and I'll talk about what we do with these products later. It's slightly more expensive than grinding my own leg quarters, but I've been shorter on time than money lately, and it's still a great deal and cheaper than buying pre-packaged commercially produced raw.

Other Options
I have one friend who buys much of her organ meats from the local butcher's college. Some people I know drive directly to some of the processors that Texas Tripe buys from. All my friends know not to throw out freezer burned meats. Once again: It's always worth asking. 

Ask everyone and anyone who eats and buys meat. Friends. Hunters. Butchers. And if you are limited to the grocery store, it is still totally doable. Don't be discouraged. But if you can put in a little extra effort, you can find wonderful resources-- higher quality, more variety-- just ask around. And tell people what you're doing.  I've found that most people think it's weird, but kind of neat and will offer their leftover meats and trims and leftovers from hunting. Just let people know.

The Nitty Gritty: Content and clarity

Edited for Clarity:
I really wanted to first clarify that I said in the last post on this topic that we don't do a lot of veggies. We've increased the variety of organ meat that we use, and decreased the amount of veggies. However, we've also increased the amount of green tripe that they get. Tripe is just the contents and lining of the stomach of ruminants, like cattle. Lots of mid-digestion grass and all the good digestive assisting qualities that the fermentation process adds. This is not the same as tripe that you find in the grocery store, which has been washed and bleached, and essentially stripped of most of its beneficial qualities. And this also makes it harder to find. But if you find it, you're lucky. It smells like shit, literally, but it's good for them, and they love it.

This is a boneless meal of cut up chicken thighs, perhaps
some liver that I see in there, canned pumpkin, and kelp.

How much?

The rule of thumb-- and this was pretty standard across resources-- was to begin by feeding 2-3% of their ideal body weight per day, for an adult dog, and then adjust as needed. We just watched for weight gain and loss and went from there. We started River off at 2%, but she's older and less active; she now eats more like 1.5%. Luna, on the other hand, has a metabolism I'd ill for. When she is very active, she eats 4% or more. Because she stays very lean, and has a very short coat, it's easy to see when she's losing and gaining. So although River weighs the most, she eats the least. It all depends on the dog.

The RMBs

As I mentioned, we felt comfortable with the 10/10/80 formula. But how to achieve that? Oh, just do ~60% RMBs and you're good, right?

...But what counts as an RMB? And aren't some bonier than others? And are you sure they can eat bones? And what kind of bones?

See? Overwhelming.

Through the Yahoo raw feeders' group, I found out about this website. The USDA has a database that you can use to determine the percentage of bone in the RMBs that you feed. To find that information, you'll find your cut, and then click on the "full report" link. You'll see a percentage listed as "refuse" and a description of what that "refuse" is (ie, bone).

It seems that most people feed chicken RMBs, at least to start with. Some also feed rib bones, necks bones-- other non-weight bearing bones of larger animals. Chicken bones are all pretty soft. But the weight bearing bones of large livestock are too hard and dense for most dogs to be edible. They can still be used as recreational bones, but they certainly weren't going to go through my consumer model grinder. Chicken and rabbit will go through a mid-range home grinder well, depending on the model, and they are easy for the dogs to crunch and to digest.

Chicken leg quarters are a favorite starter, and they are listed as 27% bone on the USDA site. This isn't a foolproof number, so don't get bogged down by that. But by making them approximately half of the dogs' meals, we're giving them a roughly 13% bone content. This is technically a bit high, but I just watched their stool for signs of white, too-dry stool or mild constipation. The leg quarters we were using were pretty meaty, so they may have been less bony than the USDA would suggest.

So depending on what RMB you choose, you can visit the USDA site, find it's % and do a little algebra to find out how much you need per day.

The heart and tongue are muscles; the kidney and
sweetbreads are secreting organs. Kidneys have a good
deal of fat around and inside them. The fat on the outside
is what's known as suet. 

Muscle or Organ??

Which one is it?? The heart is an organ right? Not when you're talking about raw feeding. It's a muscle-- a rich muscle, and one that you'll want to ease most dogs into (though mine can eat whole meals of heart now), but it's a muscle. Gizzards-- muscle. Tongue-- muscle. Lung-- eh. Kinda both? It's best if you can find a secreting organ to make up the organ portion of the meals. Don't get me wrong; all the things listed above are great for variety, and certainly better than nothing in my opinion. But ideally, you want things like kidney, sweetbreads (thymus), spleen, liver, etc. Secreting organs.

The Rest

For the boneless portion, we fed as wide a variety as possible. At first, this was what we could get at the store, and on sale. Pork (I freeze pork for 2-3 weeks to be on the safe side), loins, sirloins, center cuts, picnic roasts, all mostly on sale; whole cuts of beef from the grocery store (roasts, steaks, etc.) and ground beef from our local abattoir where I had a better idea of the quality and age of the meat; and other cuts of chicken like boneless thighs, breasts, tenders, gizzards and hearts; turkey breasts. Eventually we added beef and pork hearts and tongues and trim from butchers.

For the organ portion, we began with liver (beef and chicken) and some eggs. We were eventually able to start adding kidneys, sweetbreads, along with the liver, spleen, pancreas, etc.

Because liver deals with nutrients that are delicately balanced and that are important not to get in too high quantities (like zinc and copper), my understanding is that liver should be kept at roughly half of the organ allotment (ie, 5%). We have done this by giving it daily with other organs or by alternating days and weeks.

As for the fish, because we were feeding whole body fish, bones included, we did not supplement these days with organ or extra calcium. And because we added cottage cheese, veggies, and eggs to those meals, even though they had bones I didn't really worry about throwing my numbers off.

-------

This has changed over the years because of a change in our supplier, but it's a way to get started with what you can find at the grocery store without it costing a fortune.