Easy CBD Pet Treats – Bark Worthy Bites

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Margaret 00:01:00 You're the best. Hello, friends. Welcome to episode 271. Today we're doing crunchy, gluten free pet treats. Welcome to Bite Me, the show about edibles where I help you take control of your. Hi life. I'm your host and Certified Ganjier Margaret and I love helping cooks make safe and effective edibles at home. I'm so glad you're here. Greetings, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Bite Me. I am so glad you're here. Thank you for sharing your time with me today and I hope you enjoyed today's episode. You know, I've been doing this podcast for over five years, over five years, and I've yet to do a pet related edible for this show. And that kind of seems a little crazy to me because of course I know plenty of people with pets, but perhaps it wasn't until some people in my inner circle started getting pets of their own that it really seemed to make sense. And as it turns out, that is what exactly what's happened. So before we get into today's episode, into the meat and potatoes or the crunchy, gluten free whatever.

Margaret 00:02:23 I just want to read out a little bit of fan mail that I got. I love getting a fan mail, so please never hesitate. You can find the little tab or whatever to tap or click at the top of your favorite podcast player that you're using. It should be there. It'll just be. There'll be a message there that says you can send a fan mail message. And the first one is from Wayne in Rochester, New York, and he says, wonderful show. Gives me a lot to think about. Hopefully we can discuss this at the High Table. Thanks again for the show. Wayne. And I just want to say thank you for your message, Wayne. And yes, we can discuss that at the high table he is talking about a new weekly event that I'm hosting in the Bite Me Cannabis Club. If that's something you're interested in checking out for yourself. And he is referring to last week's episode where we discussed where I was able to sit down with Doctor Whitney Ogle to talk about cannabis and exercise.

Margaret 00:03:17 And I thought that was a really enlightening and interesting episode about incorporating cannabis with your physical activity. We talked for an hour about the latest research. She's a researcher at Cal Poly Humboldt, and she's a researcher there, but also a cannabis user herself. So that makes her a pretty interesting person to talk to about cannabis use with physical activity. And we cover a lot, and it is geared to people like you and I, people who like to engage in physical activity to keep up with their health, especially as we get older. That's one of the best ways you can ensure that you will live a long and healthy life. And of course, as cannabis users, we are interested in incorporating cannabis into that to see if it can make things better, whether you're using it for performance or recovery or any of those things. So I encourage you to check out that episode. It was really interesting. I think there's a little bit of something for everybody in that one, and there may be some things in there that surprise you as well.

Margaret 00:04:12 And the next one that I received was from someone in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. And they say, hey, Margaret, I just want to reach out and say that I'm loving all the interviews that you're doing. I live in the UK and so the stigma surrounding cannabis is still pretty strong. These interviews, like the one with Doctor Whitney Ogle, are such a great reminder that using cannabis doesn't mean that you are a stoner. You are that stoner stereotype. It's just refreshing to hear regular people talking about it alongside highly educated researchers and that they all consume. Thanks for putting out great content and helping me feel like less of a degenerate, and I really appreciate that message as well. And that is one reason why I love having amazing guests on my show, because it is a testament to how that lazy stoner stereotype is complete bullshit. I've had doctors like Doctor Whitney Ogle on the show, or more recently as well. Jackie, who put who was the co-founder of Shish Hash Cola, who spent her life in the alcohol industry as a as a buyer for the Lcbo.

Margaret 00:05:18 She was I wouldn't say she didn't say why. She is a very successful businesswoman. I've had the founder of Tea Check on my show, who's Whose background was as an engineer, and saw firsthand how cannabis helped people in his life deal with some pretty serious medical issues. And these are highly motivated, interesting people who are using cannabis themselves in most cases. And that may be they're using cannabis as a topical to ease some aches and pains. I know I use it like that, or they're consuming edibles because they prefer to consume edibles versus having another glass of wine, because they know that that wine will cause them a headache in the morning or they're consuming cannabis by smoking or vaping, because that is the best way for them to get the effects that they're looking for. People from all walks of life, and I have never thought that any cannabis user is a degenerate. And I know that's that person who sent me that lovely message, just saying it in jest. But for so long, we've all been led to believe by the powers that be, the authorities in our lives.

Margaret 00:06:23 I come from a time of when I was growing up, the war on drugs was still very much alive, and I was subjected to watching commercials on TV that, you know, the ones where they had the the frying egg and an egg or frying egg in a fry pan and saying, you know, this is your brain on drugs or the assemblies that I had to sit through where police officers would talk about the dangers of drugs and how cannabis was the gateway to heroin, and all this other propaganda that told me didn't educate me about the drugs that I would encounter in life, but instead just tried to scare me away from them. And if that's a failed approach, I don't know what is. And I have met so many amazing people on this show, whether it's guests that I've hosted on my show that I've had the privilege to talk to, or listeners who have reached out to me to share their own stories and their their feelings around cannabis. Sure, there's probably lazy stoners out there. I mean, without a doubt, there's lazy people all over the place who may also happen to consume cannabis.

Margaret 00:07:23 But in my experience, cannabis consumers come from all walks of life and we are united by the same love of cannabis. Part of the job that I'm doing here is to break that stigma. And for people like you listening to realize that you're not alone, and there's other people out there who are learning right alongside with me. And that's one of the reasons I love doing this show. So I'm really glad that you've been enjoying the episodes. If you haven't checked out that episode, it struck a chord with folks, people, so I encourage you to check that out. It was really good. But today we're moving away from the cannabis and exercise theme and moving into the pet theme. And as I mentioned, it seems crazy to me that I have yet to do any kind of pet related edible, because of course, a lot of people have been using cannabis for quite some time for their pets to give them relief for their own ailments. And I know when I worked at the dispensary, people came in often asking questions about cannabis for their pets.

Margaret 00:08:26 Unfortunately, the way the cannabis or the dispensary system is set up in Canada, I think it's much the same in the legal legal jurisdictions. In the states. It's really difficult to talk about any kind of health related issues with customers coming into a dispensary because bartenders are not supposed to talk about or make any medical claims, even though a large portion of the people coming in are looking to consume cannabis for the relief of various ailments, and that really left Bud Tenders in a tricky situation. Oftentimes we could talk about things anecdotally as it applied to our own personal like selves, or experience using certain products or other people that we knew other customers or friends and family, but we couldn't make any medical claims. And when it came to pets, we had even less training. And sometimes we would recommend that they talk to their vets. Things have changed a little bit, so I think the veterinarian industry is a little more open and welcoming to the use of cannabis for their pets than the human medical industry. I think medical doctors are still pretty reluctant often to recommend cannabis as a viable alternative to pharmaceuticals in many cases.

Margaret 00:09:38 Sometimes I don't necessarily blame them. They don't get the education, and they don't understand the complexities of cannabis and the endocannabinoid system. So if they're not confident about it, they're not going to feel good about prescribing it to their patients. But because it is so safe and well tolerated, it should definitely be something that doctors are open to discussing with their patients. And sometimes it does mean you have to explore a little bit more. You have to do more tracking, but this should definitely be taught in medical schools, but I digress. If you didn't already know, if you don't have a pet or if you have, even if you don't have a pet, this episode might be interesting for you because you may know somebody that has a pet. And of course, you know you might be able to surprise someone you care about with a little treat not only for your friend, but for their four legged fur baby. And when I say not only their friend, maybe you're making edibles for this friend or family member as well.

Margaret 00:10:33 And now you're going to be able to bring something for the fur baby too. Just remember that pets do not tolerate THC. That is correct. Pets are going to be consuming and this is the case here. You should not give them THC. Make sure that these are CBD only pet treats. Pets do not do well with THC. And you don't want to give them. Get them high. That isn't to say, and I'd like to to point this out. CBD is still psychoactive. It is just non intoxicating. And that's an important distinction. If CBD was non psychoactive people wouldn't take it. It does make changes in your body. That's why it helps with your anxiety. Can help with sleep. It helps with a lot of different medical issues and otherwise. People seek out the relief from CBD because it is psychoactive. It just doesn't get you high. And of course, that's part of the appeal for many people because perhaps they're consuming it at certain times of the day or doing certain things they can't or don't want to get high.

Margaret 00:11:39 And CBD can still offer some of the relief that they're seeking. And then perhaps they can mix it with some THC or do higher doses later. I mean, this is the beauty of cannabis. It's so nuanced. There's so many different ways that it can be used and applied in our lives. Whether you're consuming edibles, just using topicals, whatever, smoking, doing dabs. This is what I love about cannabis and this is why it gets me so exciting. Excited. I love edibles, I'm not a huge cannabis smoker. Edibles is definitely my preferred way to consume because that's just what works best for my particular body, my biology. I still get pretty really anxious. I can get really anxious quite easily when I'm consuming THC via vaporization or combustion. I don't know why I wish it wasn't the case, because sometimes it still makes me feel a little bit at odds sometimes with the cannabis community, because it's always just like, hey, let's smoke a joint. And I'm pretty cautious about that because it can make me feel anxious and just uncomfortable my body.

Margaret 00:12:47 But I get a completely different effect when I'm consuming edibles, And that's just my unique biology, and I've come to accept it, which is why I created a whole show for people just like you and me, who love to consume edibles. So let's talk about pet treats some more. The reason I chose a gluten free pet treat. As I mentioned earlier, my kids have been getting pets of their own. They're both young adults now. They can do whatever they want, and they've decided to saddle themselves down with the responsibility of pet ownership. And in some respects, I really admire that because it allows me to come over and pet the pets and give them hugs and kisses, and I love nothing more than when I come over and they are. The dogs are so excited to see me. Like, I mean, is there anything better than that? But of course it's like being a grandparent. At the end of the day, I go home, I don't pay the vet bills, I don't have to buy the food.

Margaret 00:13:45 I don't have to pick up the poo. I get all the best of the best. And of course, this is why I was interested in these pet treats, because I do like to give back a little bit, of course, because they're wonderful animals. And my one daughter got a bull terrier, a few months ago. She's still a puppy. She is so cute. But it appears that she has a sensitive stomach and she does not tolerate wheat very well. So I made these. I chose specifically a gluten free pet treat so that little Ruby could enjoy them as well. The other interesting thing about these pet treats is that they are only, well, they. It was written as a four ingredient recipe, which I love. Of course, it's now a five ingredient recipe because I added some CBD to it, some CBD oil as well, so it's still pretty easy recipe because hopefully you have that ready to go. But the things that you are you're going to need. The ingredients you're going to need for this recipe is canned pumpkin puree.

Margaret 00:14:57 And because I'm recording this in October, you may or may not have some of that on hand. I happen to have pumpkin puree on hand. Holy shit. That stuff's gotten expensive though, lately. Am I am I right like that? The price of canned pumpkin has skyrocketed. You don't need a whole lot, but I actually buy pumpkin puree pretty regularly because I will put it into ice cube trays and freeze it. And then when I make my morning smoothie, I will pop out one of those cubes and pop it into my smoothie. So I'm getting a little pumpkin in the smoothie because I like to add vegetables as well as fruit. And you know, they're always saying, taste the rainbow and eat all kinds of different colors of fruits and vegetables. This is one way to incorporate that into your diet without having without a lot of fuss or muss. So that's my little trick. If you don't have the use for more pumpkin puree but you are a smoothie drinker, then perhaps that's one way you can use the rest of this pumpkin puree.

Margaret 00:15:50 Or of course, you can make the batch larger, but it only calls for a third of a cup, so you don't need a whole lot. You're going to need peanut butter. It says no sugar peanut butter. If you just buy the natural peanut butter, that should work just fine. Just a couple tablespoons of that. You're going to need two eggs at room temperature. And the author of this recipe recommends one and a half cups of Bob's Red mill all purpose gluten free flour, the bean flour blend. I have a lot of flowers in my cupboard that I've collected over the years, so I have quite a flour collection. It just. I happen to have a Bob's Red mill, garbanzo bean flour, which is basically chickpea flour, which is what I used. I did find the batter to be pretty damn sticky. I don't know if I had anything to do with that, because I did veer off a little bit from what was recommended, and so I'm not really sure. But at the end of the day, they still turned out, so I will say, if you're going to go out and get a gluten free flour.

Margaret 00:16:54 Bob's Red mill is an excellent choice. I love Bob's Red mill for a lot of reasons, one of which it is an employee owned company, and I have no affiliation with this company at all, except I do like to buy the products from this company. When Bob retired, I think I forget how old he was, but he eventually retired as one must and he gifted the company to his employees. And I just love that in this world where it's so hard sometimes to earn a living, these people who are who are creating beautiful products are also the owners of the company at which they work. And I love that story. So it's funny, I just picked up a Bob's Red mill cookie mix the other day, because occasionally I like to have like a cookie or brownie mix or something like that. My cupboard just on the, you know, sometimes you want something quick and easy to make, an edible or otherwise, And they're just easy to throw together. And I like to support that company.

Margaret 00:17:52 So that's my story for that. So you're going to look for a gluten free flour. And she is recommending the bean flour blend I use a garbanzo bean blend. It seemed to work. Whatever you happen to have on hand. And of course if you don't need them gluten free, you could probably just use a regular all purpose flour as well, although I can't guarantee the results if you do, but I don't see why it wouldn't turn out. I also did actually go out and get a specific small bone shaped cookie cutter so that I could have these look like actual dog bones. That was that was the goal. So I picked one of those up to one day while I was out and about at my local bulk food store. And of course, I added, a little bit of infused olive oil in this as well, CBD infused olive oil. That was my magical addition, magical ingredient in addition to this particular recipe. And they're pretty easy to make. You're going to preheat your oven to 350,.

Margaret 00:18:48 And of course, you're going to line a baking sheet with some parchment paper and set it aside. In a bowl, you put in your pumpkin puree, peanut butter and eggs. You whisk it together. Then you add some flour. it becomes kind of stiff. Like I said, I found it really sticky. So one little tip I would give is when you're trying to lay out the flour, you sprinkle some more flour on a flat surface and you roll out the dough. If you put a little olive oil or oil on your hands, it can really prevent a lot of it from sticking. You don't want too much because you don't want to change the consistency of the dough too much. But it really does help because I was getting frustrated at first. You're going to roll the dough out into an oval shape, and I probably could have done better at moving the dough around myself, but once you have it laid out, then you can cut your your pieces with your cookie cutter, transfer it to your baking sheet and then bake them.

Margaret 00:19:45 And they don't spread while they're baking so you don't have to worry about spacing on the sheet. You can put them relatively closely together as well. And that's about it for 20 minutes. And there you go. Now I did find because I think I didn't let them cool enough either when I made them so that they are I put them in a jar too soon. So they weren't super crunchy. They were maybe a little bit softer. They are also perishable, remember? So that you do need to sew them up relatively quick, quickly, but you can store them in a sealed glass jar at room temperature. And I brought them over to my kids. And now I knew Ruby would actually, I was looking after one day of the house and I took a video of her enjoying my pet treats, and I wasn't surprised that she would enjoy them because Ruby will eat anything at this point. She is, at the time of this recording, maybe about five five and a half months old right now, and my daughter is always prying, disgusting food out of her mouth.

Margaret 00:20:50 When she came over to my house, she would often make a beeline for the garbage pails they were in, like the living room and stuff, because she really liked to pick out the dirty Kleenex and chew on those, which is also disgusting. And I could go on about some of the gross things that that dog likes to put in her mouth. So the fact that she enjoyed these pet treats wasn't necessarily a real testament to how good they were. If that makes sense. She liked them. Of course she liked them. That Brianna had to pull a dead bird over her mouth a few weeks ago. Yeah, of course she liked them. The real test was my other daughter's dog, Eddie. Eddie is a chow. He is aloof. He's very friendly with the people he knows. He can be very standoffish and not friendly with people he doesn't know. And that is just a feature of the breed. But Eddie is so photogenic and I love that dog too. He is also a food snob.

Margaret 00:21:47 He likes to beg for food. If you give him something or you try. He'll beg for the food. And then you put something up to his nose and he'll sniff at it, and then he'll look away like, oh, that's what it is. And no thank you. And so, like many dogs, he will eat eggs. He loves cheese. And of course, he loves meat. And that's about the extent of what he'll eat. He doesn't. Those are. That's what he likes. And so when I told my daughter about these treats that I was making, she was like, yeah, you can try giving him one, but I really don't think he'll like it. Like he doesn't eat anything beyond, like I said, eggs, cheese, meat. well, I was out of her place one evening, and I brought the treats with me, and we were having a little something to eat, my daughter and I. And I was like, this is a good time to give a little something to Eddie's being really good.

Margaret 00:22:38 I pulled the treats in the glass jar. I pull one out. I hold it up to his nose, he sniffs it, and we're like, oh, okay. He does that with everything. And then also, gently, he takes it in his mouth like so gently was so cute. And then he puts it on the ground and then he ate it. I couldn't believe it. My daughter was just like our minds were blown. She's like, I can't believe he ate it. Now she did. When I did tell her what was in it, it was the pumpkin puree, the peanut butter, the eggs, the flour. she was like, well, he he does love peanut butter, too. So this is a dog that does not like to eat a lot of things. But he still really enjoyed these pet treats. I gave him several. He ate every single one, even for the hard to please dog. These pet traits were a hit. Now what I'm hoping to do is get some more pictures and videos of different dogs enjoying these treats as part of the show notes for this particular episode, so you'll have to watch for that, because I think that would be a lot of fun.

Margaret 00:23:37 And I think you should try these out. And if you feed them to your furry friends, let me know what you think. Now I am going to add I had somebody on my show quite a while ago now, talking about the benefits of CBD. And I do remember he shared with me a pet dosing chart. So I'll include that somewhere in the show notes as well, because of course, if you are going to be giving your pets CBD, you don't want to overdo it either, so you can try and figure out how much of your CBD you want to add to your pet treats. This is one of those things too. It could be interesting to try, and I might try this because I'm going to make it definitely going to be making more batches of this. And as Christmas rolls around, it's kind of nice to have a recipe like this in your back pocket too, because you can sort of dress these up. And if there's people like my daughters, for instance, and some other people that I know that I care about, that have pets that would probably appreciate these types of treats, that can make a really lovely little gift to include the furry friends as well.

Margaret 00:24:30 So another thing that you could try doing is maybe even grinding up a CBD flower and putting it right in with the flour. I'm going to have to experiment with that and let you know how that works out, because, In this particular case. Like there's the peanut butter and the egg and the puree. The pumpkin puree are pretty bold flavors, and I'm not really sure how. I don't know if with the amount of CBD flour would be putting in there, if it would really be enough to turn the dog off based on the flavor, because I have done. If you have flour, I have made cookies before where you put discard flour and mix it right in with the flour, the wheat baking flour. And that was a recipe or not a recipe, but a trick that I discovered I never really thought of doing. Through ardent, they sometimes recommend doing that because they're basically like, once you have your flour, it's ready to consume. Perhaps a lot of the times we don't use that method because many of us who predate the internet or ease of internet usage, I don't predate internet, but I'm pretty close to predating internet.

Margaret 00:25:43 I had a computer as a kid. A lot of my friends as kids did not have computers, so I was pretty fortunate in that regard. But it wasn't connected to the internet until I was in high school. And then it was just like those modems, the dial up modems. Some of you may remember I'm definitely aging myself right now. So yeah, you can put it right in with the flower. But I think we're all scarred. Some of us are scarred from when it was before the internet time, and you couldn't just look up how to make edibles online. Bite me, the show about edibles and all the resources that I create, and many other great content creators out there, weren't out there putting out stuff like how to make edibles, and so people would take a bunch of weed and throw it right in the batter of their cookie mix or brownie mix or whatever, and then eat it and they'd be like, wow, this is not great. And of course, decarboxylation was probably not was not something that people were familiar with as a step into making edibles.

Margaret 00:26:32 And so there were some pretty horrid concoctions that were happening. Yeah, but you can carb your cannabis and put it right in your recipe, so I may try that as well, just to see how that turns out, because that could also make it one less step, one less ingredient. And if your dog doesn't mind, then it could be an even faster way to infuse your pet treats. So that's something I'm going to try because I know I have CBD carb CBD flour in my cupboard right now because I have a I have a pantry of many special ingredients that I like to have on hand for whenever I need to make my edibles. If you have a pet lover in your life and they are cannabis consumers, or they're curious about how cannabis CBD in particular can help their pets, and maybe they just enjoy making pet treats themselves and they don't even necessarily want to infuse them, because that's certainly an option. This is a choose your own adventure, and I encourage people to take control of their high life, no matter what that looks like.

Margaret 00:27:29 I encourage you to text them right now and share this episode with them. And I think that's it. That's it for this week, my friends. I'm your host, Margaret. And until next week, stay high.