Cooking homemade cat food

I currently have my kitties on commercial raw, and they're doing good. But I'm totally curious about feeding cooked homemade food as well. I know cooking removes some of the nutrients but I'd love to try it. I purchased Dinner PAWsible by Susan Thixton and Cathy Alinoli, but I noticed some of the recipes contain veggies. Can I remove the veggies without removing nutrients?

I reallyhave no idea, but I'm interested in what you're saying. This site has really made me think about diet etc.  I'd really like to know the 'recipes' for a raw diet, as we don't have access to the commercial ones here.

Any reason in particular that you want to cook the food?

A cat is a obligate carnivore and therefore relies soley on the nutrients in meat, bone and organs. It is not capable to digest plants in a way that the nutrients can be used. A cat therefore does not require vegetables in its menu. 

However.... If you found recipes that contain vegetables, you cannot simply remove the veggies. It is quite likely that the menu you found is not suitable for a cat at all. 

Why do you want to cook the home made meals for your cat? It is more trouble than feeding a raw diet and as you say you loose nutrients in the process. Taurine for example would not survive the heat. To add to that a raw diet is easier to digest than a cooked one. 

Mani said:

I reallyhave no idea, but I'm interested in what you're saying. This site has really made me think about diet etc.  I'd really like to know the 'recipes' for a raw diet, as we don't have access to the commercial ones here.

Any reason in particular that you want to cook the food?

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It's quite easy to make your own raw diet as long as you can source enough types of meat, bony meats and organs. If you don't feel comfortable with feeding bones, you can buy a grinder and make the grinded food yourself.

Is there some reason you don't want to use Alnutirin?

Using it you can make a very nice cooked chicken, chicken liver and chicken heart food if you use the nutrient calculator they provide on their web site:

http://www.knowwhatyoufeed.com/RecipeBasicnonmetric.htm

I'm looking into feeding my kitties homemade raw food (ground), but I'm interested in if it is possible to feed a homemade cooked diet without removing the nutrients, and wanted to try with my cats for snacks. I'm still feeding commercial raw (will be stopping that as soon as my Call of the Wild comes in the mail) and I don't want to feed 100% cooked diet, just wondering if it is possible. I would totally use Alnutrin, but I don't know if I can get it shipped to Canada.

kittylover23 said:

I'm looking into feeding my kitties homemade raw food (ground), but I'm interested in if it is possible to feed a homemade cooked diet without removing the nutrients, and wanted to try with my cats for snacks. I'm still feeding commercial raw (will be stopping that as soon as my Call of the Wild comes in the mail) and I don't want to feed 100% cooked diet, just wondering if it is possible. I would totally use Alnutrin, but I don't know if I can get it shipped to Canada.

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Sorry, I should have noticed that you are in Canada. TCFeline is available there and is a great alternative to Alnutrin. I don't think they say it can be used with cooked meats but if you are only going to use the cooked as snacks it would likely make the food pretty darn close to nutritionally balanced.

http://tcfeline.com/

In general, no, I don't think it is possible to make a cooked meal that would be nutritionally complete for a cat without adding at least some nutrients via supplements.

If you are only going to feed the cooked as snacks, as no more than 10 or 15% of the total diet, then it doesn't need to be completely nutritionally balanced. 

Edit: Actually the TCFeline site does have a recipe using cooked chicken : http://tcfeline.com/2012/04/19/transition-challenge-1/   In the past I have emailed them for information and they were always helpful. I'm sure they would reply to any question you have about using their product with cooked ingredients.