It’s no surprise to you I’m sure that I love to spoil my horses. And with Plezant coming home to me, I have a new pasture pet to love.
But Plezant has some dental issues that makes it difficult for him to eat regular feed, and this includes horse treats. I did find the perfect treat which is nice and soft, soft enough for him to be able to manage. They are called Nickerdoodles. But they are expensive at $27.99 for 2 pounds of treats. So I decided to make my own soft horse treats. And I wanted to share the recipe with you!
Homemade Horse Treats Recipe
The ingredients needed for these treats are easily sourced. And I am willing to bet you probably already have most of these things in your pantry.
Ingredients
- 4 cups ground flax (I used Triple Crown Ground Golden Flax)
- 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 Tablespoon sugar
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1 cup molasses
- 1 cup applesauce
- Starlight mints (optional)
The flax can be bought more affordably if you buy it at the feed store.
I bought a 25 pound bag of ground golden flax from my local big box feed store (The Big R) for around $20.00. So less than a dollar per pound, versus buying it at the grocery store for around $5.00 per pound. I just dumped some into a small feed bucket, and brought it inside. And I can feed the flax while I still use some for horse treats.
Directions
First, I preheated my oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit while I was mixing the ingredients together. Add all the dry ingredients to a large mixing bowl and stir. Once they are blended, add the molasses, and applesauce.
Continue to mix the ingredients. If you have a fancy mixer, you could use it, but you don’t need too. I used a wooden spoon and the ingredients mixed up very easily. Continue to stir until you have a sticky dough.
Next, use a cooking spray on your muffin pan. I have a mini muffin pan, so I can back like 24 treats at a time. This is by far the best pan for making fancy horse treats, in my opinion.
Now scoop the batter into the muffin pan and fill each cup almost full. If you fill it to the top, that’s ok. This batter will not expand in size when it’s baked.
Baking the Treats
The baking time may vary depending on your altitude, the pan you are using and your oven. My treats were done in about 25 minutes.
Once they are done baking, remove them from the oven.
For the mini muffins, remove them from the muffin pan, and set onto a cookie sheet. Now if you have some starlight mints, you can insert them into the center of your mini muffin, and it will look something like this:
I save the treats with the mints for Frisby. Plezant gets to have the treats without the mints. I don’t want to risk him choking.
Storing the Treats
I have a treat container with a lid, and this is what I keep in the barn. Once the treats are completely cool, I put them in the container and seal it. If you leave them out I the air, they will get hard. Which is what I am trying to keep from happening. I want the treats to remain somewhat soft so I can break them up and give Plezant a soft treat to eat.
Horse Approved
Both of my horses approved of the treats. And I like that I am able to make affordable fancy treats for my boys.
Soft Homemade Horse Treats
This is a super easy horse treat recipe that I am sure your horse will love. They bake fast, and they are inexpensive to make with ingredients you most likely already have in your kitchen.
So instead of driving to the tack store and back, save your money and your time by making your own horse treats. It doesn’t take a lot of time, or money and you have the peace of mind knowing what is in the treats you are feeding to your horses because, well you made them! And I promise, your horses will love them, even if they don’t look quite the same as the fancy-shmancy treats!
I also have another treat recipe which I was trying to duplicate German Minty Muffins. It is a little bit different, if you are looking for another treat recipe for your four legged fur babies!
9 replies to "Soft Homemade Horse Treats"
Have any recipes for horses with Cushing’s disease?
I’m working on it!
How long will these keep? Do you have any carrot flavored recipes for horses with dental issues?
I absolutely love these!
I have a 28 year old mare with no gripping surface left on her teeth. She will eat her soaked beet pulp and alfalfa pellet but wouldn’t finish it due to the texture and she wanted to hurry up to eat the hay pellet/beet pulp mash outside.
Our solution was to make these treats as full size muffins with her supplements/medications mixed into the muffins. Added some shredded apples and carrots too. She LOVES these! She would rather eat these muffins than her usual feed mash, so I stopped giving her anything additional! All others get beet pulp/alfalfa mash while she gets treats! Saves so much time, money, and frustration. She gets 4 muffins a day, each easily broken into 4 pieces. Thank you for sharing!
For anyone wondering: With 3 days worth of supplements mixed in, this makes 12 full size muffins. Mine were over filled, so I could’ve made 14. I baked mine on 350 for 40 minutes.
Do you bake the supplements/meds into the muffins, or do you add them after the fact? I’m going to make these to hopefully get my picky guy to eat his trazodone.
I do not bake the medication into the treats. I will take a pill and push it into the treat before giving it.
I wish I’d had this recipe when my Buster was still alive. He was missing 5 teeth
I just found out my horse is allergic to flaxseed! I’ve been making these for him to give him his allergy meds (the irony is not lost on me). Vet says that the amount of flax probably isn’t enough to cause a reaction but I’d like to try to find a replacement for the flax in this recipe. Any suggestions?
Our local feed store sells flax for $36 for 25 lbs! Smallest quantity they have.