Hay Cookies!

[vanessa]

So I made more hay cookies this weekend and decided to post a pic. I have cookies for Lancelot that have his daily ration of Myristol (he doesn’t like the plain myristol), cookies that have his Oxbow Natural Science herbs, and regular unmedicated cookies. The Oxbow treats are expensive, and I like to give him 2 of each typs a day (joint, urinary, immune, digestive, multi vit, etc). For a third of the price, I bought the ingredients, did some math, used my super fine scale that measures miligrams and grains, and made him cookies where 1 cookie has the herbal supplements found in 2 of each of the 7 Oxbow Natural Science supplements, except for the multivit. I also have regular unmedicated cookies so I know he is getting enough hay for his belly. In the past I have used critical care, and he loves those cookies. This time, I used 1 piec of compressed timothy hay cube, and 3 pieces of compressed timothy/alfalfa hay cubes. The cubes I used were about an inch long each, and the 4 grinded into 2.5 cups of hay. I was suprised at how much hay is actually in a cube. So… I bought some Sherwood Forest “critical care alternative”. It’s their SAR brand. They are competing quite nicely with critical care on an ingredient bases. Sherwood is more expensive than critical care, but I do like their ingredients. No soy, and they have papaya enzyme and a few other goodies in their SAR. So I aded 2.5 cups of Sherwood SAR, 2 bell peppers, 1 butter lettuce head, 120 grams of chickweed from my garden, 2 carrots, 2 bananas, 1 1/3 cup water, 2/3 cup apple juice, blended it all together, and that is Lancelot’s unlimited hay cookie. The alfalfa cubes have longer thicker strands of hay, as you can tell in the pic, and might encourage him to eat more real hay? (He hasn’t eaten hay since June last year). The hay cokies have been good for his incisors, and for the front of his side teeth. The back molars still needed some work when I took him to the dentist on Thursday, but the hay cokeis have really been good. I also think that since I’ve had him on Sherwood pellets and been giving him as many cookies as he wants, he is inally starting to gain some weight back, and his coat is the softest silkiest I’ve felt it in a long time. He is my little EC bunny-survivor, so I’m super happy to see him gaining weight, looking better, and showing more energy.  

I put 64 cookies per tray, I have 4 trays in the food dehydrator. I don’t bake the cookies, I dehydrate them on the lowest heat setting. 36 hours later they are ready. I use a really small icecream/melon scoop to form the cookies. It takes a while… If I have left over cookie mix, I freeze it for the next time.

[Luna]

Nice job! It sounds like you put in a lot of effort. I can barely bake human cookies nonetheless some deliciously varied hay cookies.

[vanessa]

Thanks, it is a lot of effort. It would be easier to just roll it out and cut it after it’s dried, but I’d lose a lot of cookie that way. Lancelot was soooo cute this evening. He can’t see or hear, but he knew I was in the room. I was chekcing on Avalon and Morgana’s hay rack. Lancelot was sniffing and running everywhere in his half of the room to try to find me – coz he knows that when I’m in the room – he gets a hay cookie. It was so cute. It makes the effort worth it 🙂

[pinknfwuffy]

These sound great! Quite a project. I like that you included lots of different ingredients to keep it interesting and healthy. I want to do something similar soon so thanks for the plan of action. I’m so glad Lancelot has taken so well to his little cookie parties. Healthy and happy buns are the best.

[vanessa]

The banana is in the recipe to hold the ingredients together, like egg, or soy lecithin. In rabbit cookies, banana or canned pumpkin are used that way.

[Luna]

64 cookies per tray at 4 trays…how long do 265 cookies last? Are they the size of human cookies or smaller?

[vanessa]

They are about 2cm diameter. round, not flat. I do the math to see how many cookies = 1 Tbsp critical care mix / hay. In this case, 3 cookies = 1 Tbsp hay/critical care. I try to give him 4 Tbsp a day, or 12 cookies. So… 3 weeks for this batch. But if you are using them as treats, not dieary supplementation, they could last a whole lot longer.

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