pureed chicken – Manitoba Ferret Association

Sometimes, giving your ferret supplementary pureed kibble aka duck soup or soupies is not enough for a ferret struggling with their weight. Most often this is a ferret with health issues; Insulinoma or adrenal disease or perhaps just old age weight loss.

Perhaps you simply want to provide your ferret with a pure protein meal as a treat. You could go out and buy a jar of “Chicken with Broth” from the baby food isle of your supermarket. You will pay a premium price for that tablespoon of food in that jar. Or, you can make your own pureed chicken from scratch and it will be even better than the store bought version. Why? You will be processing the skin and bones along with the chicken to make a more robust puree.

You will need a pressure cooker and a good quality blender.

Place your chicken into the pot and add water to the marked water line. I turn my element on hi to bring the chicken to a boil. Once I hear the steam, I turn the element down to high simmer (3.5) and set the timer for 3 1/2 hours. This length of cook time will cook the bones until they are soft and can be pureed. You want the good marrow in those bones. You want the good fat from the skin. **Remember to remove all the string from the raw chicken.

Set the lid on my chicken and start the boil

This is what the chicken will look like after the 3 1/2 hour cook time

Using a ladle, I can easily break apart the chicken

Remove a bone and test to see if you can mash it easily with a fork

I mashed the bone with a fork and it took no effort. I tested the bone the first time I did my puree as I wasn’t sure how long to pressure cook the chicken to get the bones soft. Once you have your perfect time for your particular pressure cooker, you won’t have to test the bones the next time.

Puree the chicken using the juice to make the puree a nice thin liquid consistency.

I pour the chicken puree in a large bowl as I go so that I can stir up the puree making sure that the portions pureed with bone are fully mixed in with the puree that was mostly meat. Once all the chicken has been pureed and the mixture thoroughly stirred, I pour the puree into half cup or one cup containers for freezing until needed.

One scoop of kibble puree in background and one scoop of the chicken puree ready to be warmed up in the microwave.

One serving of puree combo ready for feeding. If you find the mixture is a little too thick for lapping up, add a few drops of water to thin to the right consistency that your ferret likes.

This batch of 14 containers of pureed chicken is the result of cooking two (2) average sized chickens. One of these containers probably holds the equivalent of 3 jars of “chicken with broth” baby food. You are welcome to do the math and see in dollar and sense just how much money you are saving. I repeat myself, but this chicken puree is so much better because it contains the bone marrow and fats that ferrets need.

This puree saved a ferret named Spud who was starved almost to death. He was within hour or two of crossing the Rainbow Bridge. I started with one teaspoon every hour on the hour. After 48 hours, Spud was up to heaping teaspoon and then he never looked back. Our vet said it was a miracle that his body was able to process the food.

As of today (January 15,2022) I have five elderly ferrets on four meals a day of the kibble/ chicken puree.