As a cherished member of your family, your dog deserves nothing less than the royal treatment, especially when it comes to nutrition. While exploring the best options for your furry friend, you might have come across cold-pressed and air-dried dog foods. Both are excellent alternatives to traditional kibble, which burns off many of the natural nutrients and flavors due to being processed with high heat and steam. Our cold-pressed dog food effectively addresses these issues. Let's delve deeper into how cold-pressed and air-dried dog foods differ, helping you make an informed choice for your pet.
Understanding the Basics: A General Overview
Before we dive into the specifics, let's get a general understanding of these two types of dog food. Cold-pressed dog food is made by blending the ingredients together and pressing them at 3x lower temperatures than traditional kibble resulting in crunchy pieces of dog food. This method is straightforward and effective.
On the other hand, air-dried dog food blends their ingredients together, shape it and put it in an oven. The oven circulates hot air to dehydrate the food into soft and chewy pieces.
A Closer Look: How Each Type of Food is Made
To appreciate the differences between these two dog food types, it's essential to understand their production processes. Air-dried dog food starts with a blend of whole food ingredients like meats, fruits, and vegetables. These ingredients are reduced in size and then mixed. The combination is then slowly heated in hot chambers, where the air temperature can reach upwards of 180°F. This process reduces moisture, resulting in a shelf-stable product that has been dehydrated and can be fed straight out of the bag.Similarly, the creation of cold-pressed dog food also begins with all-natural ingredients, which are ground and combined to ensure even nutrient distribution. These ingredients are then pressed into bite-sized pieces under pressure without high heat or steam for a short amount of time, temperatures ranging from 90°F - 110°F.
Both methods use temperatures significantly lower than those used in making traditional kibble. The importance of using lower temperatures is in preserving the natural flavors and nutritional value of the ingredients that traditional kibble burns off.
Highlighting the Differences Between Air-Dried and Cold-Pressed Dog Food
Beyond the obvious production differences, there are other critical distinctions between cold-pressed and air-dried dog food. Firstly, cold-pressed food is a crunchy food vs. air dried being a soft food, this can impact the dental health of a dog. A crunchy food can help keep a dog's teeth clean and healthy. Some dogs suffer from dental issues, including teeth falling out when only being fed a soft food diet as their teeth need something hard to chew on to keep the roots strong.Regarding shelf life, cold-pressed dog food will have a shelf life of around 9 months before opening which is shorter than most traditional kibble with a shelf life of 12-18 months or more. In contrast, air-dried food can have a shelf life up to 18 months before opening the bag. Both cold-pressed and air-dried foods should be used up within 4-6 weeks after opening the bag.
An additional benefit of cold-pressed dog food is its density and digestibility. Cold-pressed and air-dried foods are more nutrient dense than traditional kibble and you can feed up to 30-50% less per meal. The digestibility of air-dried and cold-pressed food differ, air-dried foods are dehydrated ingredients and will start to bloat in the dog’s gut which can cause some discomfort whereas cold-pressed food breaks down easily and doesn’t swell within the gut for easier digestion of the food.
