How to cook sweet potatoes for dogs?

Sweet potatoes are one of the best dietary sources of vitamin A which help promote healthy skin, coat, eyes, nerves, and muscles in dogs. Moreover, plenty of fiber in these underground tubers helps maintain a healthy gut in dogs by eliminating things like diarrhea and constipation. Make sure to feed your pup cooked plain sweet potato, otherwise, is difficult to chew and can become a choking hazard for dogs’ gut. There are a number of ways to cook sweet potatoes for dogs. You can bake, mash, boil, and steam them. However, keep your dog away from processed and fried potatoes.

How to feed sweet potatoes to your dog?

Only feed your dog plain sweet potatoes. Start with small quantities, if your dog has never eaten sweet potato. Keep an eye on them to check for any negative reaction, like an upset stomach or allergic reaction. If you don’t find anything serious, slowly increase the quantity over time to make your dog healthy and happy.

Let’s dive in and have a quick look at how to cook pal’s sweet potatoes to soothe his tummy.

Recipe #1: Mashed Sweet potatoes

These are teeth-sinking treats for your dog and he is gonna enjoy their creamy and delicious taste. Its preparation is simple and straightforward, exactly similar to the mashed potatoes that you often make for your other family members. However, exclude all the ingredients like butter, brown sugar, cream, salt, or any other sort of seasoning. As all these ingredients are not dog-friendly. So better is to go with the natural, sweet and creamy taste of sweet potatoes. Let’s learn how to cook sweet potato for dogs by boiling them.

Peel off and cut the sweet potatoes:

• Start by thoroughly washing your sweet potatoes with tap water. Make sure to remove all the dirt from the skin of sweet potatoes.
• Use a vegetable peeler to remove the skin of sweet potatoes, consider rinsing them with water to remove any remaining dirt.
• Cut each sweet potato into evenly sized pieces (two inches) to promote consistent cooking. Otherwise, smaller pieces may disintegrate while larger pieces take longer time to cook.

Boil the sweet potatoes until tender

• Shift the sweet potatoes to a pan large enough to hold them with added water.
• Now add enough cold water to completely submerge them.
• Place the pot on the stove over a medium-high flame and cook them for 15 to 20 minutes after boiling.
• Check one of the chunks of sweet potato with the tines of a fork for doneness.
• If the fork slides into chunks easily it means it’s done. Turn off the flame.

Drain the water and mash the sweet potatoes

Pour the contents of the container through a strainer to drain any water and then return the chunks back into the still-hot container in which you boil the sweet potatoes. The residual heat of the pan helps dry any remaining water from the surface of the sweet potato chunks. By using an electric hand blender or potato masher, mash the softened sweet potatoes.
Let the potatoes cool. That’s it! The mashed potatoes are ready to be served.

Recipe # 2 Baked mashed sweet potatoes

It’s as simple as a breeze. Let’s learn how to cook sweet potatoes for dogs.

Preheat the oven and wash the sweet potatoes

Preheat the oven to 400° Fahrenheit and use aluminum foil to prepare a baking sheet. Thoroughly rinse the sweet potatoes under cool tap water to ensure no dirt residues remain.

Pierce the sweet potatoes

Using the tines of a fork, pierce each sweet potato several times. Position the holes evenly around the spud. It will help regulate the even distribution of heat and prevent the bursting of sweet potatoes while baking. Do not peel the sweet potatoes during this step.

Roast the sweet potatoes until tender

Roast the sweet potatoes in the preheated oven for 40 to 50 minutes. Insert a fork inside the thickest part of the sweet potato spud to ensure it’s done.

Cooling and peeling of sweet potatoes

Remove the sweet potatoes from the oven and set them aside to cool off. Once they are cool enough that you can handle them with your bare hands, peel the potato skin using your fingers. If you find difficulty in the peeling process, consider cutting each spud lengthwise and using a spoon to dog out the flesh.

Mash the peeled-off sweet potatoes

Place the flesh of sweet potatoes in a large bowl and lightly mashed them using a fork and serve to your dog. That’s all about this recipe. Let’s move toward the next.

Recipe # 3: Steamed mashed sweet potatoes

Steamed sweet potatoes are smooth and rich in nutrient content as compared to other recipes. It’s also an easy way to cook sweet potatoes for dogs in this way. All you need is heat, water, and a few pieces of cookware.

Procedure:

• Peel the sweet potatoes as you did earlier for other recipes of sweet potatoes in this article and wash them thoroughly to remove soil.
• Cut the potatoes evenly into circular chunks. Cutting each potato into three to four slices is enough.
• Place the sweet potatoes in the steam tray. Now put the steam tray in a pot filled with two cups of water at the bottom without submerging them in the boiling water below them.
• Put the pot plus a steam tray on the stove over high heat. Cover the pot. Let the potato cook until soft.
• Once cooked, turn off the heat and transfer them to a serving plate.
• Mash them Using a hand masher and allow them to cool off.

How to feed mashed sweet potatoes to your dog?

You can offer it to your dog as is or mix it in his food. The amount to give depends on the size of your dog. However, a rule of thumb is a small dog can eat about 1 teaspoon of cooked sweet potato per day and a larger dog can eat one tablespoon daily.

Recipe # 4: Homemade Sweet Potato Treats

These are easy to make and only require one ingredient; sweet potatoes. And a great recipe to cook sweet potatoes for dogs and see him go bonkers over them.

Peel the sweet potatoes

Make use of a vegetable peeler to remove the skin of the sweet potato. Continue peeling off strips of the skin until all clear.

Cut the ends of sweet potatoes

Use a sharp knife to cut the ends off your sweet potatoes. Avoid cutting too much. This will prevent your treats from having pointy tips that may burn quickly while baking.

Continue cutting until you get equally wide wedges of sweet potatoes

Now consider cutting the sweet potatoes in half lengthwise. Further cut the halves in a crosswise direction to get quarters. Keep slicing the quarters into equal wedges. Make sure each wedge is half a centimeter wide. However, the length may vary.

Bake the sweet potato wedges in preheated oven

• Spread the wedges out onto the baking sheet in a single layer. Overlapped wedges will not cook evenly.
• Bake them for about 15 minutes in a preheated oven.
• Take the wedges out and flip them using a flat spatula before returning them to the oven for another five minutes of baking.
• Do not add salt, oil, or any spice. The treats need to be as natural as possible.

Remove them when ready and cool off

Once ready, let the potatoes sit in the oven until they cool off. Test one of the treats by breaking it open. Ideally, a chewy hydrated treat is great compared to a dry crunchy one.

How to feed homemade sweet potato treats to your dog?

Serve them to your pup as a small snack. You can also consider mixing them with dog food or hiding them under their kibble to make them work for these yummy treats.
Note: Treats should never be more than 10% of a dog’s daily caloric intake. They can cause gastrointestinal upset due to the high fiber content in them.

Conclusion

Sweet potatoes can be a nutritious addition to your dog’s balanced diet when fed in moderation. As they are enriched with fiber, beta-carotene, and essential vitamins. Most importantly, they are harmless to a dog. The only secret behind cooking sweet potatoes for dogs is keeping the recipe simple, easy to chew, and delightful.

However, always consult a vet before changing your dog’s diet to prevent upset stomachs. And gradually introduce a new food into your dog’s diet by mixing it in with the existing food over the course of a few days to avoid a refusal call from your best friend!!