If you’re looking for the perfect pub snack for your pooch to enjoy while you visit your favourite pet-friendly watering hole, then look no further. We’ve discovered a range of tasty treats that were made for that post-walk pint.
Pork scratchings, Scampi fries, salted peanuts – it’s easy to order snacks from behind the bar for humans, but they’re not always the safest or healthiest option for our dogs. But this range of Serrano semi-moist treats from Buddylicious look just the part, and won’t leave your pooch with FOMO.
Made by the people behind PJ Pet Products, Buddylicious launched at Crufts, and cost around £2.50 per packet. So far, they’re available in four flavours, chicken, ham, turkey and beef, coming in pink, blue, yellow and green packaging respectively. Their branding is what really pulled me in, with vibrant colours that reminded me of REAL or Piper’s crisps you usually find behind the bar, with contrasting illustrations to depict their flavour and clean white writing across the front of the packet.
Each of the treats have more than a 70 per cent meat content, each of them containing up to 53 per cent Serrano ham, as well as additional meat depending on the flavour, combined with rice, green peas, vegetable glycerine, sunflower oil and minerals to offer a variety of flavours.
Serrano is a type of cured ham from white pig breeds originating from the Sierra de Segura mountain range (Sierra de Serrano) in the region of Andalusia in Spain. It goes through a traditional curing process that takes up to 14 months, including being air dried in cool, ventilated barns so that the hams age naturally and safely over several months.
Serrano ham is protected by a Denomination of Origin which ensures that the ham is produced according to specific guidelines in certain regions of Spain. It is considered one of the most traditional and appreciated cured meat products of Spain, exported to many countries around the world.
The treats themselves are about 1.5cm long bone shaped bites that are ever so slightly soft, making them easy to break into two to make the pack go further – ideal if you have smaller breeds or multiple dogs. Gluten free and hypoallergenic, these low-fat, high protein treats lend themselves beautifully to being training treats or as an ‘occasional extra’ whilst being very easy to digest.
We gave these a test run at The Rose and Crown, in Biddulph Moor, where Phoebe and Frank has never been before, and were able to use it as an opportunity to get the Scamps to settle in a bar environment, and build their confidence in an unfamiliar setting.
It was the perfect place to test them out as it was quite quiet in the pub on the Thursday afternoon we visited, so it eased them both in gently. Frank’s nerves visibly settled during the visit, while Phoebe learned that not everyone in the pub was there to fuss her. Some drinkers did pop over to say hello, which was great for teaching them how to greet strangers, and before long they were checking in with us periodically for one of the Buddylicious bones when they knew they were being well-behaved.
The Buddylicious treats are not yet available to purchase online, but are set to be sold on Amazon ‘soon’ – but not soon enough for our liking, Phoebe and Frank are obsessed and we can’t wait to stock up for our summer pub trips.
