Make decisions from the heart and use your head to make it work out.

For informed dog owners and enthusiasts, raw food is the number one choice for feeding. I've fed frozen raw food to Josey & Lucas for the past two years as part of my variety & rotation diet but never exclusively for extended periods. The packaged brands of frozen raw food are too cost prohibitive. However, I keep going back to it! Like I did this past weekend. Purchased a trail size of Nature's Variety Frozen Raw Chicken (0.75 lb. bag or 12 medallions @ $4.99). A 3 lb. bag or 48 medallions @ $13.99.

Bought frozen raw food + picked up free samples of dry food, too

Each medallion is 1 oz. and 65 calories.

Medallions as a topper on dry food with yogurt & supplements

Does the 'pasteurization' of this product result in its pale color? I love the idea of feeding my BCs raw food more often and exclusively (so long as it is affordable). Wanting to find out if I can make it work, I researched the large and small companies/brands:

Frozen Raw Food

• Aunt Jeni's
• Bravo 
• Creston Valley Meats
• EcoPawz Sushi for Pets
• Excel K9 Diet
• Feed This, Inc.
• K9-Kraving
• Nature's Variety
• Oma's Pride
• Primal 
• Raw Advantage
• Small Batch
• Stella & Chewy's
• Steve's Real Food
• Wagalicious

Some of these brands are available at my independent retail stores or via raw food co-op. They offer the convenience of feeding raw without the mess, hassle of making your own. The major question is, as I understand it, do I choose a complete or incomplete raw food product?  Basically, complete (meat-M, organ-O, bone-B, vegetable, fruit, whole food, supplement, etc.) is considered "complete & balanced" by AAFCO guidelines and you can feed it solely; and incomplete (M-O-B only or M-O-B with some vegetables) means you still need to add fresh foods and supplements etc. Some brands make both complete and incomplete products. For each brand and its product, I collected the following criteria (detailed in a spreadsheet):

• Complete or Incomplete
• Price per Pound
• Form (chub or patty)
• Amount (pound) to feed per day
• Price per day for 2 dogs
• Availability
• Ingredients
• % protein and % fat (for complete meals)
• % meat et al and % other (for incomplete meals)
• calories (as kcal per cup)

All of the information I sourced directly from the company's website. To compare apples to apples, I tried my best to calculate the price per pound ($/lb.) because that is how much I'd feed each BC - one pound per day. What am I willing to pay price per pound?

Bottom Line: After careful thought and dose of reality, I came up with a frozen raw food product to try on the BCs.  Oma's Pride (incomplete). Sold at the raw food co-op, In the Raw K9 Grub, who claims to have the best prices. There is no annual membership fee, no minimum order and no delivery fee (if you pick up at designated location) but orders are placed every 15th of the month for once-a-month delivery and they charge state tax plus a local county tax.

To feed my BCs frozen raw food every day for one week, I would need approximately 15 pounds. Each BC would get 1 lb/day (split into 2 meals). Example prices:

• 15 lbs of Oma's Pride (combo of 1 lb. chubs in Chicken, Turkey, Beef and Lamb) @ $28.33

The math works out to $30/week to feed frozen raw food. There would be additional expenses for feeding incomplete because of factoring in supplements, fresh foods, etc. but I always have these on hand anyway.

Only one week out the month? It's a good starting point and fits well into my variety and rotate feeding for Lucas & Josey.