My beloved, handsome, rust colored, 4 year old hound dog was sick. Every other month I had to give him antibiotics to rid his gut of a horrible recurrent bacterial infection. He was well for only a few weeks at a time, before he would be sick again. It was breaking my heart. I knew he couldn’t live like that.A friend suggested that I put him on a raw diet to help regrow the healthy intestinal flora that the antibiotics were destroying. With a little research, I started to make his food from a combination of raw chicken and veggies. The recipe said to grind up raw breast meat, wings, and necks, bones and all, with a hand grinder.

Unfortunately, raw, bloody bits of chicken were spattering all over the walls and the white tiled kitchen floor. Chicken juice poured out of the back end of the grinder onto the layer of newspapers I’d used to cover the area, in case this was a messy process. Right, in case this was a messy process! Looking back now, it’s almost funny that I actually thought there could be a neat way to accomplish this task. But, for my dog, I would do anything.

After the chicken, I still had to pulverize the veggies, as dogs don’t have the proper enzymes to break down the cell walls. Also, dogs don’t chew things as finely as we do. The vegetables alone were a three stage ordeal. First, I had to chop pounds of vegetables into half inch pieces. Then, everything went into the food processor for the first, rough grind. The third step was in the blender, with one or two cups at a time, because that was all my blender could handle. One hour later, voila! I had the proper texture of veggie mush.

The dog flourished. I dropped the pet health insurance policy and stopped visiting the vet for a gut problem

Sigh. The diet workind for the dog, but it was killing me. I was spending hours each week preparing dog food en masse and freezing as much as the freezer would hold. It was too much. I was exhausted by the whole routine and though I was doing my absolute best, I knew I couldn’t maintain this regimen much longer.

Then, drum roll please…enter the Vitamix machine. Life transformation! Now, in 15 minutes, I’m finished. I buy ground turkey and give him bones to chew. As for the veggies, I blend carrots, red bell peppers, broccoli, parsley, ginger, zucchini, and spinach, add water, pop the lid on and hit the on button.

My Bitamix blender pulverizes everything at once, with a vengeance. I pour the green goo into containers for the freezer, run water and a dot of soap in the Vitamix, give it a whir for 30 seconds, and I am finished! You hear that? Finished! No more chicken splattering on the walls, no exhausting routine…just an easy solution and a healthy, happy pup. From my hound dog, and me, thank you, Vitamix!