An easy and simple homemade grain-free peanut butter pumpkin dog treats recipe, made with 3 ingredients for dogs with sensitivities to grains. A special treat this time of year for our furry sidekicks!
Table of Contents
Like humans, dogs also come in all shapes and sizes and have unique traits and characteristics. Some dogs can eat pretty much anything and not have a worry in the world, while other dogs have sensitivities to ingredients or are incapable of digesting certain foods - with this thought in mind along with an email I received asking if my other 6-ingredients homemade dog treat recipe dog treats could be substituted with grain-free products, I decided to create a grain-free dog treat recipe that was simple (3 ingredients) with no binders (like eggs) and no added sugars as an alternative for the pups out there with the special diets. 🙂
To keep this recipe simple, there are no eggs in this recipe. You actually don't need it as a binder because pumpkin is a wonderful binder on its own. I also decided to use pumpkin as the main ingredient because it's good for dogs (especially dogs with diarrhea and upset stomachs) and it has the ability to draw moisture out of things, which is a great way to dry out the treats! Double duty with no negatives. 😉
Grain-Free Dog Treats Ingredients
- Peanut Butter - When you are buying peanut butter for this recipe, make sure to read the ingredient label to make sure there are no added sugars, xylitol, salts or additives in it. I like to use natural peanut butter (the kind where the oil separates from the peanut butter).
- Pumpkin puree - You can find canned pumpkin puree at the supermarket. Please make sure you are buying 100% pumpkin puree and not pumpkin pie filling, read the ingredient label, it should only contain pumpkin and it shouldn't contain any sugars or spices.
- Chick Pea Flour - To keep these treats grain-free, I used chickpea flour. It is also known as besan or gram flour if you buy it from the Indian grocery store.
How to Make Grain-Free Dog Treats
Dough Consistency
When you are kneading the dough, it might get a bit sticky, if it does, add 1 tablespoon of chickpea flour at a time and keep kneading. The consistency of the dough should be like play-doh. Once you have added enough chickpea flour and the dough is not sticky, you can put it in the fridge for an hour to harden it a little. This will make it easier to cut shapes out of the dough.
How to Make Dog Treats Without Cookie Cutters
I'm pretty sure our pups don't care what shape their treats come in, so if you don't have cookie cutters, it's really not a big deal. It will actually make the recipe even easier and quicker to complete because instead of using cookie cutters to make cuts into the dough and then re-rolling the leftover dough to re-cut them with the cookie-cutter again, you can use a knife and cut them into little squares or rectangles. 🙂 If you do use a cookie cutter, I found it a lot easier to dip the cookie cutter in the chickpea flour in between cuts so that the dough doesn't stick to the cutter as much.
Drying Out Dog Grain-Free Dog Treats in the Oven
I found that baking these treats was not enough to dry them out, and baking them for too long burned the bottoms. To work around that, I baked these in the oven for 30 minutes only and then turned off the heat but left the treats in the oven for an additional 30 minutes to let the residual heat dry it out without burning it.
How to Store Grain-Free Dog Treats
These grain-free dog treats need to stay dry to be stored well. Do not store these in the fridge or in a well-sealed container since that might cause condensation and trap moisture in with the treats. The more airflow you have for storage the better. I like to store these in metal tins or ziplock bags (90% zipped). They can be stored for 1-2 months.
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Homemade Grain Free Dog Treats (3 Ingredients)
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups chickpea flour (165g)
- ½ cup peanut butter - natural (90g, no sugar or salt added, see notes)
- ½ cup pumpkin puree (145g)
Instructions
Making the Dough
- In a large bowl, combine the chickpea flour, puree pumpkin, and peanut butter with your hand and knead it until it forms a dough ball. If the dough feels very sticky, keep adding chickpea flour 1 tablespoon at a time until the dough is smooth and not sticky. It should be the consistency of play-doh.
- Once the dough has come together, cover it in plastic wrap and keep it in the fridge for 1 hour. This will make the dough stiffer and easier to cut shapes out of.
- Once the dough has been chilled in the fridge for an hour, take it out of the fridge and plastic wrap.
- Line a cookie sheet or baking pan with parchment paper and set it close by.
- Sprinkle chickpea flour liberally on the counter you are rolling out the dough on. Dust the rolling pin as well.
- Sprinkle a bit of chickpea flour on the dough and rub it gently on until there is a light coating on it, then roll out the dough to about ¼ inch to ½ inch thickness.
- (Note: If the dough is still sticky, it might stick to the counter - to address that, dust the dough frequently on both sides and flip it often while you are rolling it out)
- Use a cookie cutter and cut out shapes in the dough. It is crucial to dip the cookie cutter in the chickpea flour in between each cooking cutting to prevent the dough from sticking to it. If you don't have a cookie cutter, you can cut them into squares or rectangles with a knife.
- Place the cut out shapes on the parchment paper with about ½ inch between each dog treat.
Baking & Drying it Out
- Pre-heat the oven to 350F (177C).
- Bake the dog treats for 20-30 minutes.
- After 30 minutes have passed, if you have an electric oven turn off the oven and open the oven door ajar for another 20-30 minutes. (Electric ovens usually run hotter than gas ovens)If you have a gas stove, keep the oven door closed instead. We want to use indirect heat to dry out the dog treats so we don't burn the bottoms.
- Check the bottoms every 10 minutes to make sure they don't burn.
- Once they are done drying out in the oven, let them cool in room temperature for at least 5 hours. They harden and dry out more if you leave them out for a few days. I like to usually leave them on a large plate for a few days before storing them in a metal container.
Storing the Treats
- These can be stored in room temperature for 1-2 months, as long as there is good airflow to them. You don't want to put them in the fridge or an airtight container since it can create and trap moisture and cause them to go bad faster.
Notes
- When buying pumpkin puree, make sure it contains no sugar, xylitol or spices in it. It should be list 100% pumpkin puree on the ingredients label. We don't want to use pumpkin pie filling.
- Make sure to use 100% natural peanut butter (the kind where the oil and the peanut butter separate). The ingredient list should only contain peanuts, with no sugar, xylitol, salt, fillers or preservatives.
Nutrition
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Dawn says
I wanted to make these in my dehydrator (Excalibur). Do you have a recommendation for doing them this way? Thank you!
Joyce says
Hi Dawn!
I haven't tried using a dehydrator for this, so I'm not 100% sure how they will turn out.
It looks like the Excalibur goes up to about 165F, so if you do decide to use it, I would definitely crank it to the max temperature. I think because of the low heat, it might take a very long time to dry the treats out as well.
If you do decide to use a dehydrator, let me know how it turns out! 🙂 As long as it can dry the treats out with a bit of heat, I don't see why it wouldn't work!
Joey says
Hi, I am making this recipe as I type. It says to let them dry out for 5 hours. I was hoping to use them for my puppy’s training session tonight at 7pm. Is it still ok to feed them to my puppy if they are a little soft. I’m making these as have found she has a really bad allergy to wheat etc. Many thanks
Joyce says
Hi Joey,
Yup they will be okay to feed to your puppy. The treats should be fully cooked and dried out after an hour of cooling, the 5 hours just ensures that it's super dry so that it's crunchy.
Have a fun and awesome training session with your puppy today!
Joyce
Joey says
Thank you so much 😀
Joyce says
No problem! 😀
Mollydollydoodah says
Hi, thanks for the reply! Well, I was going to make them but turns out I must have used my lasted can of pumpkin! So will have to do it tomorrow when I can go and get some more. My oven goes doen to 75C might experiment with baking them and then maybe turning them out the molds and leave them in for a longer time on low temp. It'll be trial and error but hopefully j can get them to work.
Joyce says
Ah okay! Good test! 🙂 Let me know if it turns out!
Jim Haines says
My dog loves these but................
When i made my latest batch this afternoon, I did not use parchment paper. Instead, i sprayed my non-stick cookie sheets with non-stick spray. Since my earlier batches using parchment paper were very dry after baking for 30 minutes, I decided to bake this next batch for only ten minutes. When I opened the oven door, i was amazed to find that most of the cookies were burned to near charcoal appearance! sI it possible that not using parchment paper could have caused this?
Joyce says
Hi Jim!
Hmmm! I'm pretty sure it was caused by not using the parchment paper. I find the cooking temperature runs a lot hotter when you cook it directly on cookie sheets because metal is a very good heat conductor.
The parchment paper acts almost like a barrier against the hotter heat. The dough for these treats are also pretty dry once it has been cooked, so that combined with the great metal conductor might also be a factor.
I find that different ovens also run at a slightly different temperature so my 350F might slightly hotter than your 350F which also be why 30 minutes was good enough for you whereas I had to turn off the heat and dry it out a bit more using the dry air in my oven.
For these dog treats, I like them very dry since I find they turn out crunchier (great for the pups teeth) and they have a better storage life since there's no moisture in it to cause it to mold! 🙂
Hope this helps and I'm really happy our dog loves them! You just reminded me, it's time for me to make another batch! 🙂
Joyous Ferro says
I did use peanut butter and pumpkin, not much oil in peanut butter. so I added more. Very dry and crumbly. I have put it in fridge for an hour. If still to dry I'll add more pumpkin
Crystal Stark says
I just made this recipe for my puppy. She loved them. I love how simple the recipe is. I made my treats quite small, so next time I think I would cut the cooking time down a bit, I did not leave them in the oven for the 30 minutes of dry time, as they were already dried out. I will definitely make them again. Thank you for sharing this recipe.
Joyce says
Hi Crystal!
I'm so happy your puppy loved it! 🙂 It's one of my favorite recipes to make for my pups too because of the simplicity of it 🙂 I'm happy to share and always happy to make puppies happy. 🙂 Give your little one a hug for me! 🙂
Linda says
I would like to use either buckwheat flour or coconut flour for this 3 ingredient Recipe will either work?
Joyce says
Hi Linda,
I have never used buckwheat flour or coconut flour for this recipe so I am not 100% sure long to bake them for in this recipe to get them to harden in the oven. Pumpkin with the peanut butter is a great binder, so if you do decide to test it, they should have no issues holding together. You will most likely need to adjust the cooking time to make sure they dry out properly and that they don't burn.
Whenever I am working with new flours for dog treats that I am not familiar with, I like to reduce the heat slightly and check the bottoms of the treats every 15 minutes (so they don't burn). When they seem solid (they will still be slightly soft), dry them out in the oven with the heat off after they are done cooking. The treats don't full harden until it has been cooled. 🙂 Treats will also harden if you let it sit out for a few days uncovered as well, as long as you don't have a super humid environment.
Sorry I couldn't be more help! If you do test it, let me know how they turn out! I'm curious as well! Alternatively, if I make another batch - I will test it with coconut flour since I have some and I'll let you know how they turn out 🙂 Unless you beat me to it! 🙂
Mollydollydoodah says
I'm going to try these with coconut flour tonight, see how they turn out. I might add a dash of coconut oil too if I think the dough needs it. I want to put the mix into a bones silicone mold so hopefully they shouldn't burn in them.
Joyce says
Hi!!
Awesome! Let me know how it works out with coconut flour! I have never had much success with it so I'd love to hear if they work out! 🙂
As for the silicone mold, I have not tried using one before but I don't think it would burn them but I might be worried that the treats won't dry properly and they may get stuck in them since the molds don't allow for much air flow to the batter to dry out the batter to harden. If they turn out, let me know! 🙂