Safer meat treats

Chicken in pet treats

Not that many years ago, new dog treats emerged into the pet food channels, these treats were made with high levels of chicken and were called chicken jerky or chicken tenders. These were not the first meat containing treats in the market, but they were the first predominately dried meat products.

The marketing of these meats played upon the fact that dogs find meats and meat flavours palatable, but did not recognize that dogs were omnivores (not carnivores like cats). Simply, what could be wrong with giving more meat as treats into the overall food regime of a dog? After all, dogs like meat products so eating more should not be harmful or nutritionally incorrect.

Most of these were made in China from the chicken ‘loin’ which was abundant, easily dried and then irradiated. The market grew quickly to hundreds of millions of dollars as consumers embraced new product marketing where higher meat levels in products was somehow better for dogs.

Production of chicken jerky

According to historical definitions, jerky is lean meat that is trimmed of fat, then cut into strips and dried to prevent spoilage. Water activity must be controlled if the dried meat were to be deemed safe. The process is relatively simple. Meat smoke houses made meat jerky from many meat sources coupled with high amounts of salt or sugar to reduce water activity and control microbial growth. Chinese jerky did not add sugar or salt but focused on a dryer finished meat jerky.