Star Wars Dog Treats (Sweet Potato and Bacon)

These Star Wars Dog Treats are made with leftover sweet potatoes and bacon. Shaped like Yoda, they’re a super healthy dog biscuit. Your dogs will love them!

I’m not sure about you, but I’m one of those people who really, really loves my pets. And although we only have dogs now, I am equally fond of felines and canines. So it should come as no surprise that I often cook for them too. Whether our once-a-week roast chicken scraps get turned into dog food, or our leftover vegetables gets turned into Star Wars Dog Treats, I’m always keeping them in the back of my mind when I cook.

I really believe that a healthy diet, for humans and pets, is a great way to keep everyone nice and healthy. My dogs benefit from this mentality greatly and they are often the recipients of much leftover chicken and vegetables in their food bowls. As my dogs get older, and their palette more defined (I’m not kidding), they definitely have their favorite vegetables.

Last year, I wrote a recipe about Oven Roasted Brussells Sprouts with Bacon and even though I made them for the kids, the dogs ended up going bananas for them. Seriously. It was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. The kids and I ended up getting all sorts of stupid about it and started singing to the dogs, “Who wants some bacon brussells bun buns?” It made no sense – but then again, many family laugh-a-thons are only funny if you’re there, you know?

Anyways, brussells sprouts, green beans, carrots and sweet potatoes are their favorites, and since we eat these vegetables often, they get to have them several times a week. In my opinion, sweet potatoes are the best because Not only are they chock full of nutrients, but they make an amazing base for all sorts of dog biscuit recipes. Their flavor is pretty adaptable too so you can make savory or sweet biscuits for your dogs.

So how did we get to making Star Wars Dog Treats for the motley crew? Well, like the rest of America, we went to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens over Christmas Break. We were all so excited to see it. I’m not sure who wanted to go more – the kids or my husband and I. And although this post isn’t actually about the movie, the Star Wars Dog Treats idea was hatched after we saw it.

So when I was making our weekly roast chicken a few days ago, I threw some extra sweet potatoes into the oven for the dogs. This way, I could use them in their food for the week and bake up a batch of tasty biscuits for them. The kids thought these came out really well and the dogs housed them. They didn’t get as excited about them as they did the brussells sprouts, but they were excited enough that we started getting ridiculous again and renamed them something else entirely.

From here on in, these Star Wars Dog Treats are now known as Yoda’s Yummy Yam Yams. Again, it was pretty hysterical this afternoon, but I’m not sure how funny it’ll be to you.

Oh, and before I go, we also have a recipe for Star Wars Wookie Cookies just in case you want to make some homemade treats for your skin-kids too. They go great with our Star Wars Party Plan, just in case you need some ideas for the little Jedis in your life!

STAR WARS DOG TREATS (SWEET POTATO AND BACON)

Makes 45-50 Star Wars Dog Treats. Yoda cookie cutters came inside The Star Wars Cook Book: Wookie Pies, Clone Scones, and Other Galatic Goodies.

Ingredients:

1 large sweet potato or yam, cooked
2 pieces of cooked bacon, crumbled
1/4 cup coconut oil, melted
2 eggs, beaten
2 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 – 1/4 cup flour, for rolling out your dough

Directions:

Step 1:Remove sweet potato from the skin and mash in a large mixing bowl. Add crumbled bacon, coconut oil and eggs; whisk to combine.

Step 2: Add flour and cinnamon and mix with a wooden spoon until ingredients are combined. The dough will feel too wet – this is perfectly okay as it will take on additional flour in Step 3.

Step 3: Cover your work surface in parchment paper (this is a messy project). Pour 1/8 – 1/4 cup flour on your lined worked surface. Place dough on your well-floured surface and roll it out to about 1/4 – 1/2 inch thick. As you roll the dough out, it will absorb more wheat flour and get drier. If the dough still feels to wet, just mix some more into the dough ball – just go gradually; you don’t want the dough to get too dry!

Step 4: Using your Yoda cookie cutter, start cutting out biscuits. I wanted Yoda to have some eyes, so I used a straw to punch out the eye holes.

Step 5: Line some baking sheets with parchment paper and bake your Star Wars Dog Treats for 35 minutes. Watch them closely – if you leaned towards the 1/4″ thick for skinnier biscuits, you want to make sure they don’t burn.

Step 6: Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool completely. Store in an air tight container.

NOTE: If you do not have a cooked sweet potato or yam you can quickly cook on in the microwave oven. Prick the sweet potato several times with a fork and heat it in the microwave on high until tender, approximately 6 minutes.

Love your dog,

Denine