Homemade cat food

I am not comfortable feeding any amount or type of raw meat to domestic cats. Maybe for a feral cat colony, but certainly not cats I adopt at a shelter or friendly strays in the neighborhood. However, I am 100% in favor of buying meat in a grocery store, cooking it, and giving it to a cat.

So my question is, "Would that be safe for cats?" because obviously the meat is sold for humans. Of course I would choose something that is naturally high in fat and proteins cats need and has not been processed in any way. Is this OK if I use a recipe instead of just serve the meats as is?

I'm not sure I understand the question? Are you asking if there are recipes for making home made food for your cats that is cooked food? If so the answer is yes. It requires a more indepth understanding of feline nutrition, because you have to account for the nutrients, especially amino acids, that are affected by cooking the meat. Cooked bones cannot be fed to cats, so calcium will have to be properly supplemented to offset the phosphorus in the meat. But there are recipes out there.

BTW, Dr. Pierson partially cooks her recipe: http://www.catinfo.org/?link=makingcatfood

But it is a time-tested recipe, as she's been using it for about 10 years now. :nod:

Maybe that will be helpful?

Oh believe me, I fully understand I have to learn a lot to do it right. Hopefully that recipe will not be too hard to practice.

It is a simple, straight-forward recipe. She also provides an option for making it without a grinder that handles bones (using human grade bone meal as a supplement).

But it's meant to be only partially cooked. If you want to fully cook the food, the recipe doesn't hold, because too many of the amino acids are destroyed, and the supplements she recommends do not account for fully cooking.