The final count on Sunday was 122 biscuits, four of them broken, all cooling on every flat surface in the kitchen while a 68-pound dog sat in the doorway making a low noise like an idling truck. The broken ones are his. He knows it. He's known it since about the second batch.
How this started
The first December in this house, 2022, we were broke in a very specific way. Hank's turkey twine surgery had gone on a credit card two weeks earlier, he'd only just had his staples out, and we'd lived on this street for four months without really meeting anybody. What we did know was which houses had dogs, because Hank had told us, loudly, through the front window.
So I baked dog biscuits. Flour, a can of pumpkin, peanut butter and eggs cost almost nothing, and walking a bag up to someone's door is a lot easier than knocking empty-handed. People were so nice about it that we did it again the next year, and now it's just what we do the second weekend of December.
The recipe
This makes about 60 two-inch biscuits. I make two batches, one after the other, because doubling it in one bowl turns into an arm workout.
- 2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
- 1 cup plain canned pumpkin (plain pumpkin, not pie filling, which has sugar and spices in it)
- 1/2 cup peanut butter, label checked
- 2 eggs
- 2 to 4 tablespoons water, only if the dough needs it
Stir the pumpkin, peanut butter and eggs together, then work in the flour until you have a stiff dough. Add water a spoonful at a time if it's crumbly. Roll it out about a quarter inch thick between two sheets of parchment, cut, and bake on lined sheets at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Then turn the oven off, prop the door open an inch and leave them in there for another hour to dry out.
About that peanut butter label: I read the ingredient list on every jar, every time, even the brand I always buy. Some peanut butters contain xylitol (it sometimes shows up as "birch sugar"), and xylitol is dangerous for dogs. It takes five seconds in the store.
The mistake that added the drying step
That first year I skipped the hour in the cooling oven. The biscuits came out soft and pretty, I bagged them the same afternoon, and about a week later a neighbor mentioned, very kindly, that the last few in her bag had gone fuzzy. Soft biscuits hold moisture, and moisture in a paper bag goes one way. Now they dry until they snap clean in half, and I tell everyone to keep them in a tin and toss any that look off after a couple of weeks.
I also used a big four-inch bone cutter that year, which was silly for a street with a Chihuahua on it. Now it's a two-inch bone and a little maple leaf cutter, and the big dogs just get more of them.
Bagging and the walk
Each bag is a small brown paper lunch sack with eight biscuits, folded over twice and closed with a sticker. No ribbon. Our house has had enough of string. Inside goes a card in my handwriting listing all five ingredients, so anyone whose dog has a food allergy or a touchy stomach can check before sharing. A few people have told me their dog can't have wheat or peanuts, and those owners get a card and a plate of people cookies instead. Treats are something every owner gets to decide on, and if they're not sure, that's a question for their own vet.
This year's list was fifteen bags: the shepherd across the street who barks at Hank through the window all year and gets a bag anyway, the beagle two doors down, the Chihuahua on the corner, Addie's family's old lab, and the rest of the block. The retired couple next door don't have a dog, but they get cookies, and they always ask about Hank before they ask about us.
The whole project costs about $16: flour, two cans of pumpkin, a jar of peanut butter, half a carton of eggs, a pack of bags and stickers. We deliver Saturday afternoon, Hank on leash and wearing the plain red bandana from Halloween, which is the only costume he's ever approved. It takes about an hour, mostly because people want to pet him.
Mabel abstains from the entire operation. She watched the rolling and cutting from a kitchen chair, sniffed one biscuit, looked at me like I'd served her a brick and went back to the radiator shelf. The four broken ones are in a jar on the counter. Hank gets one after supper, and by Wednesday the jar will be empty.
