A bowl of comforting porridge or congee brought me back childhood memories as I remember my dog likes to eat home cook porridge. And I will tell you why.

I used to have this dog which is a cross breed. I had the dog when I was about 13 years old. Our family friend advised us that to make the dog fur looks shinny and thick, we must give him natural black “gula melaka” (a kind of traditional palm sugar in Malaysia) mixed with porridge. It really makes his fur thick and shiny black. Even few of my neighbors asked us what special food we gave him that make him looks so good and healthy.

Ancient Chinese Food – Porridge

The Chinese porridge (or otherwise known as congee) is a soupy or liquidized version of boiled rice. Once upon a time, the poor in China made porridge to prolong the household consumption of rice grain; because it uses much smaller amount of rice for each meal. However, due to its soft texture, it is also a traditional Chinese baby food. The fact that it is easy to digest and curative effect on the body, those who are recovering from sickness could use it as a main food intake.

Porridge is good for humans. What about for dogs?

Porridge alone may be easy to digest but may lack certain nutritional values essential for your dog’s health maintenance. To make the porridge diet for your dog more balanced, it is important to include a combination of fats, carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins, minerals, and water in a balanced diet that provides sufficient calories to meet their daily needs for growth, activity, and repair.

My Dog’s Special Diet

“Gula Melaka” (Palm sugar) was originally made from the sugary sap of the Palmyra palm or the date palm. Now it is also made from the sap of the sago and coconut palms and may be sold as “coconut sugar.” The sugar is a golden brown paste, sold in tubes, blocks or tin cans. It may be light-colored or dark, soft and gooey or hard. As a lightly-processed product of cottage industry, it varies greatly from batch to batch. In Indonesia, sugar made from the Borassus (Palmyra palm) is known as Gula Jawa (“Javanese sugar”) or gula merah (red sugar). Sago Gula Melaka is a very popular soft dessert in Malaysia. You can see it in almost every traditional function, such as parties, wedding reception, gathering, or school parties.

We never feed our dog a lot of meat. My mother will cook porridge mixed with a bit of “gula Melaka”, “ikan bilis” (malay word for a family (Engraulidae) of small, common salt-water fish) or small amount of beef. We usually used low grade brown rice (at that time we do not know it is actually organic rice and nobody ever heard of organic food at that time).

Avoid products that use meat by-products like bones, feet, and intestines, chemical preservatives like BHA and BHT and difficult-to-digest grains like corn, wheat, gluten and soy. These grains are sometimes listed as a protein source in place of meat in commercial dog food.

Many health problems, like allergies that cause itchy skin, are simply caused by a poor diet and improper allocations of the wrong kinds of food. It is recommended that you start making note of the ingredients until you notice an improvement.

My dog was so used to eating porridge that he will refuse to eat if it is rice. The porridge smells good even to people. That is why I believe in homemade natural food that is best for human is guaranteed good for your dog.

Protect Your Dog’s Health

The health of your dog is very important and hinges on good nourishment and plenty of exercise. The pet owner who feeds their dogs a good balanced diet consisting of special dog food will save a lot of money and have a happy healthy pet.

If your dog has a healthy skin and coat, is energetic, and gets good marks from the veterinarian on the annual checkup, you can continue to feed the same diet of natural food no matter which they have chosen. If the dog is having problems, it is important to investigate if its food might be a contributing factor and take steps to fix things by adding a supplement, switching to another food, or asking the vet to run some diagnostic tests.

Shocking News

On March 15, 2007, FDA (US Food And Drug Administration) learned that certain pet foods were sickening and killing cats and dogs. FDA found contaminants in vegetable proteins imported into the United States from China and used as ingredients in pet food. FDA’s Office of Criminal Investigations announced that two Chinese nationals and the businesses they operate, along with a U.S. company and its president and chief executive officer, were indicted by a federal grand jury on Feb. 6, 2008. The indictments are for their roles in a scheme to import into the United States products they claimed were wheat gluten. The products were contaminated with melamine and used to make pet food.”

How can we protect our animal companions? Make your dog healthy and happy by feeding him healthy, natural dog food now!