Christmas Dog Treats: Safe Homemade Recipes and Foods to Avoid

The best Christmas dog treats are the ones you bake yourself from a short list of plain ingredients: pumpkin, oats, eggs, sweet potato and peanut butter without xylitol. The risky part of Christmas is not the treats. It is the table, the tins of chocolate and the mince pies left on the coffee table.

Below: the holiday foods dogs must never eat, three easy recipes, a dog-safe icing, and how much is too much.

Christmas Dog Treats at a Glance

Christmas food	Safe for dogs?	Why
Plain turkey breast, no skin or bones	Yes, small amounts	Lean protein
Plain carrots, green beans	Yes	Low calorie
Plain canned pumpkin	Yes	Not pie filling
Chocolate	No	Toxic to dogs
Mince pies, fruitcake, pudding	No	Raisins and currants
Stuffing and gravy	No	Onion and garlic
Sugar-free sweets and gum	No	May contain xylitol
Cooked turkey or ham bones	No	Splinter

What Christmas foods can't dogs eat?

The Christmas foods dogs can't eat include chocolate, grapes, raisins, currants and sultanas, onions, garlic, leeks and chives, anything sweetened with xylitol, macadamia nuts, alcohol, raw bread dough and cooked bones. Many holiday dishes hide one of these: mince pies, Christmas pudding, fruitcake, stollen, stuffing and gravy are all off the menu for dogs.

Each danger has its usual December hiding place:

• Chocolate. Advent calendars, tree decorations and gifts under the tree. Dark and baking chocolate are the worst.
• Grapes and dried fruit. Mince pies, Christmas pudding, fruitcake, stollen, cheese boards.
• Onions and garlic. Stuffing, gravy, sausage meat. Cooked or powdered, they still count.
• Xylitol (also called birch sugar). Sugar-free sweets, gum and a few peanut butters.
• Macadamia nuts. Cookie tins and nut bowls.
• Cooked bones. Turkey carcasses and ham bones, often straight from the bin.

Fatty scraps are a separate problem. Turkey skin, crackling and pan drippings are not toxic, but they can trigger a painful stomach upset or pancreatitis.

Wrapped chocolate under the tree is a classic December emergency, because dogs smell it through paper. Our guide to dog-proofing your Christmas tree covers edible ornaments and gifts left on the floor.

What should you do if your dog eats something toxic at Christmas?

A dog that eats chocolate, raisins, xylitol, onion or any other toxic food needs a call to your vet or a pet poison hotline straight away, even if the dog seems fine. Many of these foods cause no signs for hours. Tell them what was eaten, roughly how much, and when. Don't make your dog vomit unless a vet tells you to.

Two things speed up that call. Keep the wrapper or packaging, because the label shows the ingredients. And look up your nearest emergency vet before December 24, since many regular clinics keep shorter hours over the holidays.

Which Christmas dinner foods can dogs eat?

Dogs can eat a few Christmas dinner foods if they are plain: lean turkey breast with no skin, bones, gravy or seasoning, and plain boiled carrots, green beans or sweet potato with no butter or salt. Put a spoonful aside before anything is seasoned. That small plate is a safe way to include your dog in the meal.

Skip everything that touched the roasting pan. Turkey skin and drippings are mostly fat, and stuffing almost always contains onion. Pigs in blankets are salty and fatty. A tablespoon of plain turkey is plenty for a small dog.

What ingredients are safe in homemade Christmas dog treats?

Safe ingredients for homemade Christmas dog treats include whole wheat or oat flour, eggs, plain canned pumpkin, peanut butter without xylitol, unsweetened applesauce, mashed banana, sweet potato, carrots and plain unsweetened yogurt. Check every label. Peanut butter and "sugar-free" products are where xylitol usually hides, and pumpkin pie filling contains sugar and spices.

A few swaps to keep your baking dog-safe:

• Carob instead of chocolate. Carob looks like chocolate and is safe for dogs.
• Oat flour instead of wheat for a dog with a known wheat allergy.
• No sugar, salt, raisins or nutmeg. Dogs don't need them, and nutmeg is a common holiday spice best kept out.

Trying an ingredient your dog has never eaten? Give a small amount first and wait a day.

How do you make dog-safe Christmas cookies?

Dog-safe Christmas cookies need only five ingredients: 2 cups (240 g) whole wheat or oat flour, ½ cup (120 g) plain pumpkin, ¼ cup (65 g) xylitol-free peanut butter, 1 egg and 2–4 tablespoons of water. Mix, roll to ¼ in (6 mm) thick, cut out stars and trees, and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 20–25 minutes.

Peanut butter pumpkin stars

1. Heat the oven to 350°F (175°C) and line a tray with baking paper.
2. Mix the pumpkin, peanut butter and egg, then stir in the flour.
3. Add water a spoonful at a time until the dough holds together.
4. Roll it out on a floured board and cut shapes with a 2 in (5 cm) cutter.
5. Bake for 20–25 minutes until firm and dry on the bottom.

The batch makes about 30 small cookies. For a crunchier biscuit, switch the oven off and leave the tray inside for another hour. Let the cookies cool completely before icing or storing.

What other homemade Christmas dog treats are easy to make?

Two other homemade Christmas dog treats are almost effortless: sweet potato chews, which need one ingredient and a slow oven, and frozen yogurt "snowballs", which need three ingredients and a freezer. Neither needs a mixer or a cookie cutter. Both keep your oven free for the real Christmas baking.

Sweet potato chews. Slice a washed sweet potato ¼ in (6 mm) thick. Bake on baking paper at 250°F (120°C) for 2½–3 hours, turning once halfway. Thinner slices turn crisp; thicker ones stay chewy.

Yogurt and banana snowballs. Mash 1 ripe banana into 1 cup (245 g) of plain unsweetened yogurt with a spoonful of xylitol-free peanut butter. Spoon into a silicone mold and freeze for 3 hours. Serve one at a time, straight from the freezer. Some dogs don't digest dairy well, so start with a single snowball.

Homemade treats also make a good filling for a DIY dog advent calendar, one small treat per day.

How do you decorate dog treats without sugar icing?

Dog treats can be decorated with a thick "icing" of plain unsweetened Greek yogurt mixed with a little tapioca or corn starch, piped from a sandwich bag with the corner snipped off. Let the icing set in the fridge for a few hours. For color, a teaspoon of pumpkin gives orange and a little beet juice gives pink.

Skip human icing, sprinkles and edible glitter. They add sugar, and some decorations aren't food-safe for dogs at all. Iced treats should stay in the fridge.

How many Christmas treats can a dog have?

Treats of every kind, Christmas ones included, should make up no more than about 10% of a dog's daily calories. For most dogs that means one or two small cookies a day, not a plateful. Cut the dog's regular meal slightly on days with extra treats, and ask your vet first if your dog has diabetes, pancreatitis or a food allergy.

Christmas is a long season. A treat for every visitor, every gift and every scrap under the table adds up fast. Keep one jar of dog treats by the door and ask guests to use only those.

How do you store and gift homemade dog treats?

Homemade dog treats keep for about 1 week in an airtight tin at room temperature, up to 2 weeks in the fridge and up to 3 months in the freezer. Moist treats like the pumpkin cookies spoil faster than dry ones. Throw out anything that smells off or shows mold.

A tin of homemade treats makes a lovely gift for a friend's dog. Add a label listing every ingredient, so the owner can check for allergies. Small bags also slip neatly into a dog's Christmas stocking.

For a gift the owner keeps after the treats are gone, add a small framed portrait of their dog. AI Dog Portraits is built for dogs and turns one photo into a watercolor, cartoon, fantasy or Renaissance-style portrait in a minute or two, with a $1 three-day trial.