New To Home Cooked Food

[Khrad]

Hi there! I'm new to home cooked meals. I can't really do any raw because of young kids in the house so I was thinking about cooked. Not ready for my own supplements yet so I was thinking about trying Balance IT the carnivore blend. I was planning to cook the meat in a pressure cooker and separate the broth once cooked. Then at every feeding use the ground-up meat and add in some warmed up broth (my cats like their food a little warm) and add that with the balance it and feed it that way. However I noticed on the balance it website that they discourage using the drippings, is it because of the fat or would it be an overdose of nutrients? I wanted to use the drippings instead of the oil that theyre suggesting. Any help is very appreciated as I am very confused and I just want to do what's best for my cats! Thanks in advance.

 

[lisahe]

Welcome to The Cat Site, Khrad!

I'm not familiar with Balance IT but wanted to say that it sounds a bit odd to me that they recommend throwing away the drippings. I use the EZ Complete supplement with cooked meat and EZ is very definite about being sure to use the drippings because of the nutrients. That Balance IT recommend using oil sounds even odder to me: that's vegetable-based and cats are generally better at handling animal-based ingredients, like the fat on meat. I can understand why you're confused! I'd want to use the drippings, too.

What page on their site were you looking at? I did some quick searching and found their site a bit confusing. I also saw their "Autobalancer" page and clicked through on one protein and see that they include recipes with very high carbs. I would definitely stay away from those, in favor of meat and supplement only, no vegetables or grains.

If you're looking into various supplements, I'll add that our cats love EZ Complete and Alnutrin is another popular supplement among Cat Site members' cats.

 

[Khrad]

Thank you Lisahe for responding.

 

[Khrad]

I looked into Alnutrin and I think I'm going to go with that. So would I add the alnutrin on after I warm the food? And should I add some omegas and probotic supplements in addition to the alnutrin?

 

[LTS3]

Cook the meat and let it cool to room temperature. Then add in the Alnutrin and water, fish oil if you are using that. Then portion the food out and freeze. Probiotics should be added to the each serving of food before you serve it. Freezing may affect the potency of the probiotics. What probiotic are you planning to use? If you are using a Human probiotic, one capsule a day is plenty for "maintenance". The capsule can be split into two doses if you prefer. Just pull apart the capsule, sprinkle half over the food and slide the capsule back together. I suggest designating a small container for the partial capsule and keeping it in a place where you will remember about it and also somewhere out of reach of the kids.

 

[Khrad]

Thank you! I was thinking of using warm water to warm each serving and then add in the alnutrin, omega and probotic to each serving

 

[LTS3]

The thing with Alnutrin and other pre-mixes is that the instructions are for like 2 lbs of meat. So it's just easiest to cook 2 lbs of meat and add the appropriate amount of pre-mix afterwards, mix, portion, and freeze. That way you know the food has the appropriate amount of nutrients. It will be difficult to know how much Alnutrin to add to each serving of food before you serve it.

 

[Khrad]

If I do premix everything, wouldn't I lose the nutrients when I add in the warm water to make the food warm?

 

[mschauer]

If I do premix everything, wouldn't I lose the nutrients when I add in the warm water to make the food warm?

If your concern is that the warm water will degrade nutrients then, no. Some vitamins are degraded by high heat but it would have to be something like >300 degrees (I don't remember the actual temp). Just warm tap water won't degrade any thing.

I agree with LTS3 that it would be easier to mix the Alnutrin thoroughly into the 2 lbs of food. Adding it at meal time can certainly be done but it could be difficult to measure the very small amount needed for a single meal.

 

[Khrad]

Thank you ladies for the clarification!