Grandma Lucy's Artisan Dog Food, Grain Free and Freeze-Dried - Artisan Chicken, 3Lb Bag

Why did you pick this product vs others?:I’ve fed this product to my dogs as a supplement to the veggie mix I make for years now.Texture:This product hydrates very quickly in a pinch. Short on time? This product works great in such a situation.Health:You need to add meat to this product. It is not a full-nutrition item until you add meat.Quality:This is a family-owned business and I like giving my business to family-owned companies. They make many nice products and the food quality appears to be good. This particular product seems to be heavy on the instant potato so I always add other vegetables… mixed vegetables, Lima beans, zucchini, red beets. Dog food:My dogs love this food.

Seamus is our sweet, gentle, kind, adorable, 9 1/2 year old "eternal puppy" who doesn't just wag his tail when he's happy .... he wags his entire body! He's a clown, a best friend, and a champion snuggler who howls whenever he hears a siren.On a February day in 2014, my husband and I went to a local animal shelter to meet a puppy that caught our eye on Petfinder. We never did end up meeting that puppy because the minute we laid eyes on our copper-colored angel with the soulful eyes, we knew we'd found "the one". Our Seamus literally picked us - and we're so grateful he did. He was 8 months old when we brought him home - and despite signs that he wasn't treated very kindly by whoever surrendered him to the shelter, he chose to love and trust his strange new humans completely. He's been our joy ever since.My husband and I aren't the kind of people who care about a dog's pedigree. He grew up with mutts and so did I. Every dog I've ever had has been a mutt. As far as I'm concerned, the muttier the mutt, the better! The people at the shelter assumed Seamus was a Retreiver mix, while my husband and I guessed he was a Coonhound mix. Of course it didn't matter to us what his mixture was, but our curiousity got the best of us and we bought one of those "doggie DNA" tests. And what a surprise we got!It turns out Seamus is a Beagle/Great Dane mix. I really don't want to know HOW such a strange mixture came to be. I'm just glad he's ours!I realize that all these details about Seamus are irrelevant to this review, but they are not irrelevant to us. The love we have for our dog plays a major role in the products we choose to buy for him. People who love their dogs and/or aren't completely ignorant about animal nutrition don't dump cheap byproduct-filled kibbles in their dog's bowl for every single meal - or let them chomp on bones made from Chinese rawhide (or any rawhide for that matter). My dog is a beloved family member, and I make sure his diet reflects that. We don't buy him garbage. We try our best to educate ourselves about animal health and nutrition. We try to stay vigilant so that we don't get duped by unethical companies that sell low quality products that could cause harm to our beloved companion. My husband and I don't have (or want) children, so we dote on our dog. We fuss over him and worry about him. We want him to have everything he needs to live a long, healthy, happy life with us. Nutrition is essential for health and longevity, so we read ingredient labels and educate ourselves.And that brings us to Grandma Lucy's - the wholesome ingredients are what got me interested. My dog really seems to enjoy it, so I've given it a chance. I've added both the chicken flavored one and the pre-mix (which I combine with eggs, turkey, chicken, or tuna) to his rotation. I rotate a few different trusted, tried-and-true, high quality dog food brands and varieties that I know my dog likes and that have never caused any intestinal issues or allergic reactions (Some Acana kibble here, some Instinct Raw there, Grandma Lucy's rehydrated with hlsome homemade bone broth, a carton of Honest Kitchen wet food, a can of Wellness Core, some boiled chicken, the occasional raw meaty bone, etc.) I do this so that my boy gets maximum nutrition, and also to give him some variety so that he doesn't get bored. I make sure he gets plenty of healthy "people food" in his diet - lean meats, organic yogurt, sweet potatoes, apple slices, etc. - either as snacks, or mixed in with his meals. I've come along way since the 1990's when I actually believed Hill's Science Diet and Iams/Eukanuba were 'high quality' dog foods 🤮, and that feeding "people food" to dogs was detrimental to their health.When I mix up a bowl of Grandma Lucy's, Seamus whimpers and whines and wags his whole body in anticipation. (He can be very impatient and pushy when it comes to food!) I add a few pumps of fish oil along with his various supplements, then he scarfs it all down and licks the bowl clean. In the past, Seamus has tried "The Honest Kitchen" line of dehydrated dog food, but he wasn't very enthusiastic about it. That was disappointing to me because The Honest Kitchen is a great brand. He did eat it, but it took a bit of coaxing. I'm not trying to turn anyone away from The Honest Kitchen. Seamus loves their wet food and their goat's milk, so I still buy them every so often. Unfortunately, he just wasn't crazy about their dehydrated food. On the other hand, my neighbor's dogs that I occasionally "puppy-sit" both tried The Honest Kitchen dehydrated food and loved it, so it was never a question of quality - it was simply about my dog's preference. When it comes to dehydrated dog food, my dog prefers Grandma Lucy's over The Honest Kitchen. If Grandma Lucy's can keep my dog happy and healthy, it'll definitely stay in his rotation.

My dog loves the chicken. As a topper doing a tablespoon of the freeze dried mix one time a day wetting it and mixing his kibble in this lasted us 2 months which makes it an inexpensive way to give him the same love as before but the freze dried pellet toppers never soaked up the water well. This absolutely does in moments and speeds up our process significantly while also reducing the cost of showering my pet with a little extra love. As a pet care professional I will be adding this to something I refer to clients. Thanks for an amazing product that is cost friendly. Don't ever change it!

The media could not be loaded. My dog absolutely LOVES this dog food. You can see the real chunks of meat & veggies. Really easy to make. Reminds me of an oatmeal type consistency. I also love that it is non toxic & affordable. Funny story, he actually got into the dry bag on the counter one night so now we have to hide it from him!

This smells great- like chicken broth/bullion. I just wish it were a little chunkier. It sets up MUCH quicker than the other brand I was using and does have little bits of chicken. I use twice as much water as food, let it set for about half a minute and then put his kibble and "vitamins" on it and stir. He loves it. It looks a lot like ground oats. If it is, it's really expensive for that. I'm hoping it's as good as the label declares.