I don't think that I can afford homemade food

[crazy4strays]

I made a couple of batches of home cooked cat food. After crunching the numbers, I was quite surprised to realize that it's more than double the cost of grain free canned food.

I have no idea where U Stew got their 65 cents a day estimate.

It would be close to $2 or more per day to feed a cat on home cooked.

That is with using meat that was under $2 per pound too and buying the supplement powder straight from the company, instead of at Amazon where it's $5 more expensive per bag.

What am I doing wrong? Or is the company's estimate just way off?

 

[missmimz]

Can you be more specific? How many oz are you assuming your cat is going to eat per day? Can you break down the costs for us?

Homemade is cheaper than canned for me, because I choose to feed more expensive canned food. But I also make raw, not homemade cooked. U-stew is a little pricy, I think, as are a lot of the homemade cooked pre-mixes. 

 

[crazy4strays]

I'm planning on the cats eating 6 oz per day. I got about 69 oz out of the first two batches. The bag would make 5 batches. That would equal about 172.5 oz. or about the equivalent of 28.75 6 oz cans. Assuming that meat is $1.90 per pound, it would cost $19 for the meat for that much cat food. It would cost about $2.50 in eggs, and $32.50 in supplement powder. That equals about $54 for those 28.75 6 oz cans of cat food. That also equals about 31 cans of 5.5 oz cat food.

So that would put my per "can" cost up to $1.74 for 5.5 oz. I could get some really fancy commercial canned food for that. The reality is, though, that $1.74 per can is way over my target price.

Most of my grain free canned food that I purchase runs in the $0.69-$1.20 range.

 

[missmimz]

I don't really have a good answer for you, maybe someone else does. I think you can make homecooked with Alnutrin, which is significantly cheaper than U-stew, but there was some questions about how to make it complete as Alnutrin is technically made for raw. I think there's more info about that in the homecooked thread. 

I'm rather surprised you can get good quality canned for for that cheap. I can't get anything i feel comfortable with feeding under $1.50 a can. Part of the appeal of making your own food too is that it's leaps and bounds better quality than anything in a can, so even if its a little more expensive, its worth it. But if you're on a strict budget, it might not work for you. 

 

[crazy4strays]

I am comfortable with feeding Dave's Pet Food, 4Health turkey and giblets, Wellness (in big cans to save money), etc. All of which are good quality foods and run under my target price.

 

[missmimz]

I am comfortable with feeding Dave's Pet Food, 4Health turkey and giblets, Wellness (in big cans to save money), etc. All of which are good quality foods and run under my target price.

Then maybe you answered your own question? 

 

[crazy4strays]

I was just hoping that I could make homemade work for me. Oh well.

 

[missmimz]

I was just hoping that I could make homemade work for me. Oh well.

Maybe you can if you look into using another supplement as it seems like that's throwing you off budget wise. This thread talks about using Alnutrin, although you have to do a little more work to make it completely balanced, so you'd have to decide if you feel comfortable with it. Hopefully others can chime in and give you more info. 

 

[crazy4strays]

Yes, the U Stew is what's making it so expensive, for sure.

 

[crazy4strays]

I checked and sadly the Better in the Raw is almost as expensive as U Stew.

 

[feline03]

I have 3 cats that I am transitioning.  I make my own food and do not use any "premix".  I use supplements as listed from Dr. Pierson or Feline Nutrition site.  It has cost me $20 per week to feed 3 cats.  If I gave them 2 cans of grain free a day (6 cans a day @ 1.40 per can of Soulistic by Petco) that would cost $8.40 per day.

With the homemade raw I'm spending about $2.85.  One of my cats eats 6-7oz per day but the other are still getting 1/2 canned and 1/2 raw.  I put 1 oz x2 a day.  When they go completely raw, I will give 4 oz all together .

I think it is much less expensive to make the whole recipe  yourself and do not buy the premix but use your own separate supplements.  Not that much extra work and you have control.

Hope this helps.

 

[crazy4strays]

I would need a very precise idiot proof recipe, lol. Is there a recipe like that, where you can just measure precisely and be done with it?

 

[silverpersian]

You might find this post (and thread) useful:

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/303246/is-it-cheaper-than-buying-store-bought-cat-food#post_3806830

I use my own supplements rather than a pre-mix. It really isn't difficult.

 

[crazy4strays]

I will check that out. What I need is a very cut and dried formula that's easy to measure and put together.

 

[missmimz]

 
You might find this post (and thread) useful:

http://www.thecatsite.com/t/303246/is-it-cheaper-than-buying-store-bought-cat-food#post_3806830

I use my own supplements rather than a pre-mix. It really isn't difficult.

Right, but the OP is making homecooked, not raw. A lot of the pre-mixes made specifically for homecooked take into consideration the need for organs as well as additional vitamins that may be lost from cooking. 

@crazy4strays Perhaps post over in the homecooked recipes thread. There are users in that thread that could advise you on using Alnutrin or your own mix to make the cooked food completely balanced. 

 

[silverpersian]

I apologize. I overlooked that part. Everything in the thread to which I pointed is about raw food (which I find much easier to make).

 
Right, but the OP is making homecooked, not raw. A lot of the pre-mixes made specifically for homecooked take into consideration the need for organs as well as additional vitamins that may be lost from cooking. 

@crazy4strays Perhaps post over in the homecooked recipes thread. There are users in that thread that could advise you on using Alnutrin or your own mix to make the cooked food completely balanced. 

 

[silverpersian]

I will check that out. What I need is a very cut and dried formula that's easy to measure and put toget

 

[crazy4strays]

Also, one thing that I liked about cooked food is that I could use already ground meat. That alone made cooked food pretty fast. We're vegetarian and I don't think that we'll ever buy a meat grinder just for the cats.

So any time that I saved by not cooking, I would be spending painstakingly chopping the raw meat. Unless meat is okay to chop in the vitamix.

The other reason why I leaned toward cooked is that supermarket meat is full of bacteria. Cats are designed to eat freshly caught raw meat and commercially processed meat worries me.

 

[silverpersian]

Chopping in the vitamix would be fine. You would have to use boneless meat and add powdered eggshell (which you can buy or make) to the supplement mix.

My understanding is that the bacteria in supermarket meat is unlikely to make a cat sick. Many of the members of this forum (myself included) have been feeding it to our cats without incident. Their digestive tract is much shorter than ours and they can handle a higher bacterial load. Think of all the wild cats who eat from the same carcass for weeks.

I am not trying to convince you to switch to raw. What works for me may not work for you. I just wanted to make sure that I share the information I have in case you are considering the raw option. It has made a very positive difference in my cat's health and appearance, so I try to share what I know, given that I was completely ignorant of the raw option for years.

Good luck with whatever option you choose. It is clear that you really care about your cats!

 

[missmimz]

Also, one thing that I liked about cooked food is that I could use already ground meat. That alone made cooked food pretty fast. We're vegetarian and I don't think that we'll ever buy a meat grinder just for the cats.

So any time that I saved by not cooking, I would be spending painstakingly chopping the raw meat. Unless meat is okay to chop in the vitamix.

The other reason why I leaned toward cooked is that supermarket meat is full of bacteria. Cats are designed to eat freshly caught raw meat and commercially processed meat worries me.

I buy raw boneless meat chubs from Hare Today and then mix with Alnutrin with calcium, and done! No grinder required. But this is not a cheap way to do raw, unless you live really close to HT.  For me shipping is super expensive, but I don't trust meat from the supermarket either.