Peanut Butter Pumpkin Dog Cookies

When it comes to present-giving in my circle of friends, you’d be a bad friend if you didn’t think about the needs and desires of our furry family members. That’s why I made those cat toys back in the fall. And that’s why I’m making these healthy-yet-tasty dog treats.

Start by preheating your oven to 350°F and line some baking sheets with parchment paper. In the bowl of your electric mixer, plop in 3 cups flour (I prefer a gluten-free blend because wheat is not that great for dog digestion), 1/2 cup oats (I used oat meal here because I had some that needed using), and 1 teaspoon cinnamon. Give that a stir.

Next drop in 1 cup canned puréed pumpkin, 2 eggs, and 3 tablespoons peanut butter.

Mix that until it’s all well combined. The dough will be pretty stiff, which is why I prefer to let the mixer handle it.

Now you *can* roll the dough out on a floured surface and cut it with cookie cutters and make it all cute and stuff, but I’m lazy and plus the dough was pretty sticky so I opted to pipe the dough instead. I dumped it in a large Ziploc bag, snipped the tip, and started laying out little dough logs.

The perfect size for the smaller dogs in your life. Eventually the bag split so I took little buttons of dough, rolled them into a ball in my hand, flattened them between my palms, and baked those too.

Bake the cookies for about 20 minutes, until dry and crispy, and then let them cool.

Here are the logs.

Here are the buttons.

Here is Gren waiting patiently for his cookie. Look at that focus. The final shot of him taking the cookie was a giant blur because he was so focused so I’ll leave you with this one …