Max's Peanut Butter Biscuits

Yesterday I made these peanut butter biscuits for a very special friend of mine. Here he is.

Meet Max. He's a Shih Tzu and unfortunately he's Sir D's, not mine. I've had my fair share of pets in the past but my mum has never let me have a dog, saying that she and my dad would have to end up taking care of it, and that if I want one so badly, I can get one when I move into my own place. So I've had to make do with other people's dogs and Max is one that I get to see quite frequently.

Max turns 11 this year and although we know he was born in April, we don't know the exact date. So we sort of just assigned him to have his birthday on April Fool's Day. He is a little bit foolish sometimes - he gets overly excited whenever anyone in the family comes home and grabs his plush toy and starts galloping excitedly around the house, veering around the corners a little too sharply and stacking it face first onto the tiles. But he's a resilient fellow, and he just gets right back up and starts running around again.

I found out last year that he loves cookies (especially gingerbread!) so I thought I'd make him a batch of home made dog biscuits this year. I found a few peanut butter dog biscuit recipes on the interwebs and combined them together to make these biscuits, and drizzled them with a little bit of white chocolate. And yes, white chocolate is safe for dogs to eat since it only contains trace amounts of theobromine, the substance that is toxic to dogs.

These biscuits aren't just for our four-legged friends, humans can eat them too! In fact, I tried a few of them when they came out of the oven - they're a little bit bland since they don't have any added sugar (only some honey) but they taste peanutty and I actually quite like the texture of them. And my unsuspecting dad ate a biscuit when he got home from work without knowing they were supposed to be dog biscuits and didn't think there was anything wrong with them.

I haven't had a chance to give these to Max for him to try but I hope he likes them! The tell-tale sign of him enjoying his food is when he licks his nose after eating, like this:

Too cute!


Peanut Butter Dog Biscuits
adapted from Paula Deen and Rachael Ray

1 cup peanut butter
1 cup milk
2 tablespoons honey
1 egg
2 1/4 to 2 1/2 cups plain flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 pinches ground cinnamon
40g white chocolate

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC. Microwave peanut butter for about 10 seconds or until soft. Add the milk, honey and egg to the peanut butter and whisk to combine.

2. Add the mixture to the remaining dry ingredients and stir until you form a stiff dough (you may have to use your hands). If you find the dough is a bit too wet you can add flour until the dough is to a cookie consistency.

3. Roll out the dough on a clean, floured work surface to about 0.5cm thickness. Cut out biscuits with your cookie cutter and place on a lined baking sheet. These biscuits don't spread too much so don't worry about leaving a big space between the biscuits. Bake for 12-15 minutes (depending on the size of your biscuit) or until golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

4. After the biscuits have cooled, melt the white chocolate in the microwave or over a double boiler. If the consistency of the white chocolate is too thick for drizzling, add a bit of vegetable oil to thin it out. Drizzle the white chocolate over the biscuits with a spoon. Store in an airtight container.

And one final photo of Max on his birthday last year...