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Cavalier foodies dine on satin balls
By Kim Campbell Thornton
April 27, 2010
I’ve been trying to put some weight back on Bella, so a couple of weeks ago I made a batch of satin balls, also known as fat balls, to supplement her diet.
I’ve been familiar with these treats for a while — breeders use them to put weight on show dogs or dogs that have been sick — but I had never concocted any myself.
I can see why they’re supposed to be good for packing on the pounds. Several versions of the recipe are available, some of which call for lots of fat- and sugar-laden ingredients, including cereal, molasses and Karo syrup. I went for the simplest and least sugary of them, attributed to Betty Lewis, and upgraded the ingredients.
Here’s what the recipe looks like if you want to go all healthy on your dog.
1 lb organic, grass-fed ground beef, 15 percent fat
1 8-oz. package cream cheese
1 jar natural peanutbutter (no salt or sugar)
1 jar wheat germ
1 dozen egg yolks
1 cup Bob’s Red Mill oats, soaked in cream to cover
I dumped all the ingredients into my largest mixing bowl and worked them until they were well mixed. If you have a Kitchen Aid mixer or large capacity food processor, that’s probably a faster way to go, but stirring it all up yourself is a good workout.
Form into meatballs or patties depending on the size of your dog, then freeze.
Half of this recipe makes approximately 72 meatballs. I pull out four a day to give as mid-day treats or add to meals. Of course, there is no handing out only one of these just to Bella; everyone has to share. I pinch off little bits of one meatball to give to Twyla and Harper and then give Bella a big chunk. They don’t seem to notice or care about the difference in amount as long as they get something.
Next up to try: Chef’s chocolate salty balls (dogs, don’t eat these at home or anywhere else)
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Wow, that looks like a recipe for pancreatitis! How much does Bella like peanut butter? When Pepper gets old, I figure I’ll just give her a Kong an hour, filled with natural peanut butter if she needs weight.
The cream cheese on top of everything else just makes me nervous — add whole eggs with more whole grain to hold the thing together and I’d probably feel better about the recipe. Of course, having gone through pancreatitis ONCE with Pepper has made me super gun shy — not an experience I ever want again!
Comment by Dorene — April 27, 2010 @ 5:51 pm
You know, fat doesn’t cause pancreatitis… it just triggers it in dogs who already have a pre-existing susceptibility to it.
Comment by Christie Keith — April 27, 2010 @ 5:57 pm
No, I didn’t know. My vet who treated Pepper for the pancreatitis told me he thought it was a bacterial infection running through and not what she ate THAT TIME, but told me to watch the fat in the future.
She’ll be 8 in July and hasn’t had a problem since so my guess is that she doesn’t have the pre-existing condition (as I’m careful, but since she’s outside so much, she finds stuff — last week, someone tossed a fast food vanilla milkshake and she was in heaven!), but the experience was so horrible that I don’t even give her cheese. (Don’t worry, Miss I-love-peanut-butter isn’t deprived no matter what she might tell you if she ever gets on Facebook!)
Comment by Dorene — April 27, 2010 @ 6:05 pm
OMG, do you have a recipe for skinny balls for fat dogs? Of course, they have to be as tasty as fat balls!
Comment by Jan — April 27, 2010 @ 6:51 pm
I’m pretty sure by this point that Bella does not have a pre-existing susceptibility to pancreatitis (knock on wood).
Comment by Kim Thornton — April 27, 2010 @ 6:55 pm
This satin balls recipe is *significantly* different from the one I’ve used to fatten up neglect cases, pack calories into a lactating momma, and even wean pups. The recipe I use is meant to be a complete diet — this one is not. I’ll have to find it. It’s a little tedious to gather all the ingredients, but I do a big batch and freeze in small portions for when it’s needed.
The Chocolate Salty Balls, OTOH, would not make it past the kitchen counter.
Comment by H. Houlahan — April 27, 2010 @ 8:18 pm
I don’t make skinny balls; I guess they’re Just Right balls.
I use non-fat or low-fat cottage cheese, eggs, lean ground turkey, rolled oats, wheat germ, and grated broccoli.
Of course these are treats, not a complete diet.
Comment by Marge — April 28, 2010 @ 9:07 am
thank you for the simple recipe….mine has so man ingredients!
Comment by Mary — April 28, 2010 @ 12:45 pm
Mary, I think you were the one who suggested these in the first place. I also liked this recipe because it was so simple. I wasn’t looking for something that was a complete diet, and I didn’t want one that was really high in sugar. I did see that some of the Satin Ball recipes say they are a complete diet, but that wasn’t what I needed and I wasn’t wild about any of them. Heather, I’d be interested in seeing the one you have. Marge’s sounds good, too.
Comment by Kim Thornton — April 28, 2010 @ 1:37 pm
Raw????? Will that not hurt my dogs?
Comment by Adrian — January 31, 2011 @ 6:53 pm
Adrian, lots of dogs, including mine, eat a raw diet. You wouldn’t want to give a large amount of these to a dog who is unaccustomed to a raw diet (you wouldn’t want to give a large amount of them to a dog who IS accustomed to a raw diet, either), but no, they won’t hurt your dog.
Comment by Kim Thornton — January 31, 2011 @ 7:28 pm