Gently Cooked vs Raw: An Honest Look at Fresh Feeding

Updated June 2026 · Educational content — not a substitute for veterinary advice

We gently cook our food, so you know where we stand. But raw feeding deserves a fair hearing — many raw feeders are the most engaged pet owners we meet, and they're right about more than the pet-food industry likes to admit.

What raw feeding gets right

The raw movement's core argument is the same as ours: dogs and cats thrive on real, recognizable meat — not extruded pellets. Raw diets deliver high moisture, real protein and serious palatability. On all of that, we agree completely. The disagreement is about one step: heat.

Why we cook — gently

• Pathogens are the deal-breaker. Raw meat can carry Salmonella, Listeria and E. coli. Studies repeatedly find these in commercial raw pet foods, and pets can shed bacteria at home even when they seem fine. Major veterinary bodies — including the AVMA and WSAVA — caution against raw feeding for exactly this reason. Gentle cooking removes that risk for the pet, and for the humans handling the bowl.
• The risk isn't only the pet's. Raw feeding turns your kitchen into a raw-meat handling station twice a day. Households with young children, elderly family members or anyone immunocompromised carry most of the danger — a point even many raw advocates concede.
• Balance is hard to get right raw. Home-prepared raw diets are frequently short on calcium or skewed in mineral ratios. A cooked recipe built to a target — protein, organ, vegetable, balanced minerals — is simply easier to verify.
• Bones. Whole raw bones chip teeth and occasionally obstruct. We take the nutrition out of bones a different way — a 72-hour bone broth — and leave the splinters out of it.

What cooking costs — honestly

Heat isn't free. Some heat-sensitive nutrients, like certain B vitamins, are reduced by cooking — that's true in your kitchen too. The point of gentle cooking is that the loss is small and predictable, nothing like the high-heat extrusion that makes kibble (we compared the two here). Recipes are balanced with that loss already accounted for.

If you still choose raw

Your call, and we'd rather you do it safely than switch grudgingly: buy from suppliers with pathogen testing, keep meat frozen until use, dedicate a cutting board, disinfect surfaces and bowls after every meal, and keep raw food away from immunocompromised family members. And feed a tested, balanced recipe — not just minced meat.

FAQ

Isn't raw more "natural" for dogs and cats?

Wolves and wildcats eat raw — and live shorter, harder lives partly because of it. "Natural" describes how food occurs, not whether it's optimal. Gently cooked food keeps what matters about prey — meat, moisture, variety — without the microbiological lottery.

Can I switch from raw to gently cooked food directly?

Usually, yes — pets coming from raw transition easily because the ingredients are similar. Follow the same gradual mixing as our 7-day plan.

Does gently cooked food taste as good to pets as raw?

In our experience the enthusiasm is identical — warmth actually releases more aroma. Picky eaters usually decide within one bowl.