Oatmeal Dog Biscuits

These are some of the easiest dog treats I've made yet, and my pups absolutely love them!

I'm posting this without pictures as I need to make more tomorrow, but wanted to post this for a friend tonight.

There's only 4 ingredients - pumpkin, oatmeal, peanut butter, cinnamon - for this recipe, and you can do some of the prep work ahead of time and have the dry ingredients ready to go. No wheat, no corn, or vegetable oil (which may include corn).

So let's get to it!

Equipment needed:

• Baking sheet
• measuring cups & spoons
• cookie cutter (if you want a specific shape)
• parchment paper
• strong wooden spoon
• large mixing bowl. 
• Optional: food processor or blender, rolling pin

Shopping List:

• 5 cups  Old-fashioned rolled oats (or steel cut) OR oat flour
• 2 tblsp Peanut butter (make sure it has no artificial sweetners, best if you use organic)
• 1 tsp    Cinnamon
• 1 can (15oz) pureed pumpkin - pay attention to this, you do not want a pre-spiced pumpkin, you simply want plain old pumpkin; pre-spice pumpkin may contain nutmeg which is bad for dogs

Prep work:

If you have a good blender or a food processor, make your own oat flour by grinding down the old-fashioned oats into a "rough" flour. (I will get pictures of this).  This is when I pre-make a lot half of this recipe. I make the oat flour and then poor/ladle/spoon it into a 32oz. Ball jar and top it off with the cinnamon. This stores really well and it's the perfect amount to mix with the "wet" ingredients. Don't convert all of the oats to oat flour, you'll want about a cup to roll or press the dough into.

If you don't have a food processor or good blender you can purchase oat flour online, although a lot of stores now carry oat flour. You can use wheat if you like, but my dogs prefer the oatmeal.

Directions:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees Farenheit (375 works too).
2. Dump entire can of pumpkin into the mixing bowl; add the oatmeal flour, cinnamon, and peanut butter.
3. Mix well with a wooden spoon
4. Line the baking sheet with parchment paper - you can do without but they may be hard to remove from your baking sheet

Remaining steps using cookie cutters:

1. Taking a handful of dough, shape into a rough ball and place on parchment paper
2. Roll out or pat out the dough until it is roughly 1/4" thick
3. Cut out with cookie cutters or a glass
4. Place cutouts on the lined baking sheet
5. Bake full sheet for 30-35 minutes; depending on your baking sheet size you may only get one sheet
6. When done, turn off the heat and open the door, leave the baking sheet (or last baking sheet if you had more than one) in the oven for another hour while the oven cools. You want these to dry out well to make them more crunchy for your pup.

Remaining steps NOT using cookie cutters:

1. Use a spoon or your hands and pull a small amount of dough out and roll into a ball. It should be about the size of a walnut.
2. Place the ball on 
3. Flatten out the ball with the palm of your hand or the bottom of a glass to about 1/4" thick
4. place 
5. Bake full sheet for 30-35 minutes; depending on your baking sheet size you may only get one sheet
6. When done, turn off the heat and open the door, leave the baking sheet (or last baking sheet if you had more than one) in the oven for another hour while the oven cools. You want these to dry out well to make them more crunchy for your pup

Store the treats in an airtight container. These may be frozen or placed in the fridge to make them last longer. With two large Great Pyrenees in my house, I rarely have any around at the end of the week.