Cooked Dog Food: How It Changes Your Dog’s Life

The term freshly cooked dog food basically describes exactly what the name promises: It is a dog food made from real, fresh, and above all, visible ingredients – just as you would prepare it for yourself in your own kitchen from fresh ingredients.

In dramatic contrast to the industrial mass production of conventional dry or canned food, only high-quality muscle meat, nutrient-rich offal, fresh vegetables (such as carrots, broccoli, or sweet potatoes), valuable oils (such as hemp oil or salmon oil), and easily digestible carbohydrates are used.

These ingredients all meet food quality (human-grade) standards. This means they are microbiologically and qualitatively so high-quality that they would theoretically also be approved for human consumption. No inferior slaughter byproducts are used, guaranteed!

The dog food market is gigantic, confusing, and often characterized by extremely strong marketing. To be able to make the actually best decision for the long-term health of your dog, we must objectively, mercilessly, and scientifically compare the four most common feeding methods with each other.

Dry food is by far the most widely used feeding method worldwide. It is cheap, doesn't smell, doesn't grease, and can be extremely easily stored in large bags. But the health price for this human convenience is extremely high. In modern veterinary medicine, classic dry food is increasingly discussed critically and classified as "Ultraprocessed Food" (highly processed foods) . Current findings warn ever louder about the potential long-term health consequences of such highly industrially altered rations.

To make the hard kibble, the raw ingredient mass is pressed in the so-called extrusion process under extremely high pressure and at temperatures of sometimes over 140 degrees Celsius. Through this massive thermal and physical stress, natural vitamins, secondary plant compounds, and enzymes are almost completely denatured and destroyed. They must be artificially applied back to the kibble in the form of sprays at the end of the process.

Many concerned dog owners mistakenly believe that the only alternative to this "Ultraprocessed Food" is the often complicated and hygienically risky BARF (raw feeding). But that is a myth! The modern veterinary recommendation for a healthy, species-appropriate dog nutrition is "Minimally Processed Food" – i.e., minimally processed food. Gently cooked fresh food is exactly that: It provides the full natural nutrient power of real food, without having to take the germ risks of pure raw feeding.

In addition, dry food usually contains far less than 10% moisture due to the manufacturing process. Dogs must make up for this immense lack of moisture through their water bowl. If your dog doesn't drink enough (which unfortunately happens extremely often), this can put enormous strain on the kidneys over time and lead to the dangerous formation of bladder stones. Read more about this here: My dog drinks a lot – this could be why . Another myth: dry food cleans the teeth. This is factually incorrect. The starch contained in it forms a sticky film on the teeth and promotes tartar buildup and plaque.

With BARF, the dog is fed exclusively raw meat, raw offal, meaty bones, and raw, pureed vegetables. This feeding method undoubtedly comes very close to the original diet of wolves. But beware: Today's pet dogs are no longer wild wolves, and handling raw meat in the kitchen poses massive, scientifically proven hygiene risks.

Scientists from the renowned Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Zurich examined 51 commercial raw meat rations (RMBDs - Raw Meat-Based Diets) for dogs and cats. The published result was shocking:

• 72.5% of the samples did not meet the microbiological EU hygiene standards for enterobacteria!

• In over 62% of the samples, antimicrobial-resistant (AMR) bacteria (ESBL producers) were found – i.e., multi-resistant germs against which common antibiotics in medicine often no longer work!

• In several samples, extremely dangerous Salmonella were detected (Nüesch-Inderbinen et al., 2019).

These antibiotic-resistant pathogens not only endanger your pet's immune system (gastrointestinal infection), but also pose a highly serious risk (zoonosis risk) to human owners.

Wet food from commercially available cans is generally very popular with dogs due to its more intense aroma and high moisture content of about 70 to 80%. For the water balance and kidneys, it is definitely better than dry food.

The disadvantages: To keep an airtight can shelf-stable at room temperature for years, it must be heated extremely strongly (sterilized). This merciless process almost completely destroys the natural nutrients of the ingredients.

Important to understand: It is completely normal and veterinary-medically necessary to supplement vitamins and minerals in any high-quality complete feed (including our HelloBello fresh food!). Why? Because the energy requirements of our modern pet dogs have dropped sharply compared to their ancestors, the wolves, due to significantly lower activity – but not their absolute requirement for vitamins and minerals.

The crucial difference, however, is: While we at HelloBello merely optimize an already nutrient-rich, gently cooked base, vitamins in canned food often have to be added massively simply because the intense heat of sterilization has literally "overcooked" the meal to death beforehand. In addition, it is precisely in many cheap cans that the unclear thickeners (such as Cassia gum), flavor enhancers, and low-quality animal by-products are hidden, which cause gastrointestinal problems and intolerances in sensitive dogs every day.

Freshly cooked dog foodr brilliantly combines all the fantastic benefits of the methods mentioned above and at the same time completely eliminates their dangerous weaknesses!

• It is natural: It consists of pure, intact foods, just like BARF.

• It is highly digestible: Since the cell walls of vegetables and meat are already broken down by gentle cooking, making them ideal for the short dog intestine, it is the perfect daily dietary food for dogs. In a comparative study, it was also proven that gently cooked rations increase macronutrient digestibility compared to extruded dry food and even raw feeding, and positively change the stool consistency and microbiome (Algya et al., 2018).

• It is safe and hygienically flawless: The precisely controlled, gentle heating reliably kills all pathogenic germs and resistant bacteria.

• It is suitable for everyday life: It is calculated, portioned, and frozen or freshly refrigerated by experts (as with HelloBello) and delivered directly to your front door.

The idea is tempting: "If gentle cooking is so good, I can just mix the food myself on the home stove, can't I?"

As a short-term dietary food for acute diarrhea, homemade chicken with soft rice is excellent. However, as a permanent, daily diet without professional guidance, it is a major risk. An amateurishly cooked meal of meat and vegetables without exact veterinary supplementation almost always lacks vital macro- and micronutrients.

That this is not a myth of the food industry is proven by large-scale research: A recent study by Texas A&M University analyzed over 1,700 recipes for homemade dog food. The alarming result: Only 6% of the homemade rations met the essential nutrient requirements for dogs! This means that 94% of privately fed dogs are at risk of suffering from a creeping deficiency. Similar results (95% deficiency) were already found in a major study by UC Davis in 2013 (Stockman et al., 2013).

If important nutrients such as calcium, zinc, or essential vitamins are missing in the long term, serious bone, organ, and kidney problems threaten.

The absolute basic rule is therefore: Anyone who wants to cook food for their dog permanently should do so exclusively in close cooperation with a specialist dog nutrition veterinarian – or directly trust professionally calculated, ready-made, freshly cooked dog food from experts.

If you decide on a ready-made, freshly cooked dog food you should absolutely look for the following quality features when choosing a provider:

1. Complete feed meeting requirements: Pay close attention to the label to ensure that the food is legally declared as "complete feed". Only then is it 100% guaranteed that all vital nutrients are included.

2. Developed by veterinarians: The recipes should have been developed by real, certified veterinary nutrition specialists to absolutely exclude malnutrition such as the dreaded "Rubber Jaw".

3. Individual portioning according to calorie requirements: A really good provider calculates the exact daily ration for your individual dog. Why is this so incredibly important? Scientific long-term studies prove that lean dogs have a significantly higher life expectancy and suffer less from osteoarthritis in old age (Kealy et al., 2002; Salt et al., 2018). Recent evaluations also confirm that the use of whole, fresh foods in the diet has a measurably positive effect on body composition (muscle-fat ratio), efficient energy consumption, and important blood health markers (Roberts et al., 2023).

4. Food quality & regionality: All animal and plant ingredients should come from the best, regional food quality and be absolutely transparently broken down on the label.

If you decide on the absolutely healthy path of freshly cooked dog food, you naturally want only the best for your loyal four-legged friend. At HelloBello, we combine all the described health benefits of this modern feeding method with the highest quality standards.

• 100% honest transparency: With us, you know exactly what ends up in the bowl, down to the gram. No mysterious animal waste, no harmful chemicals.

• Regionality: We source our fresh ingredients as regionally and sustainably as possible.

• Developed by specialists: Our recipes are healthy and designed to be 100% nutritionally complete according to the latest scientific standards.

• Individually tailored to YOUR dog: Every dog is unique in its metabolism. With our intelligent food configurator, we calculate the exact daily food amount in grams.