Human Food for Dogs:
Which are Safe and Which are Deadly?

Picture it: You’re standing in your kitchen whipping up tonight’s dinner. Perhaps you’re a broke college student and preparing your standard meal of instant noodles. Maybe you’ve got a few more bucks and are making yourself some salmon with risotto. Or if you’re really well-off, maybe you’re watching your private chef boil some lobster to eat with a side of caviar and crackers.

(I don’t know what you people eat.)

As you turn around, you’ll practically trip over your dog who had been eagerly waiting for any scrap to fall from the heavens and onto the floor.

Whatever your income level, at some point in your kitchen you’re going to become aware of the feeling that you’re being watched...

via GIPHY

As you shoo him out, he sits like the good boy that he is just outside the kitchen boundary.

You start to feel guilty.

You give him a few glances as you stir your hard block of ramen or spoon that caviar onto some fine china.

At some point, your mind will begin to wander…

“Can he eat instant noodles?”

...you might wonder.

Or perhaps,

“Is seafood toxic to dogs?”

You give him another glance and he’s suddenly become quite the actor.

He has contorted his face in such a way that he looks like a puppy again. His big, watery eyes seem to be saying,

“Please. I’m starving. If you love me at all you’ll give me a wee bit of that salmon skin.”

If you look close enough, you might even see a tear fall from his eye and hear Sarah McLachlan singing about angels in the background.

You hem and haw, thinking about the mercury content in salmon.

But wait, is that just for raw salmon?  I thought that was just sushi?

What about risotto, can he eat that? It’s not meat. I thought dogs only ate meat.

But do they?

What the hell do I know? He ate his shit earlier today. Clearly, he’s got an iron stomach.

If you’re a dog owner, we’ve all experienced this temporary kitchen crisis.

“Can dogs eat this? Can dogs eat that?”

The last thing we want to do is cause our little friends any discomfort, but what gives you the most pleasure and comfort is probably food.

Humans have a tendency to want to share things that comfort us in hopes that it will comfort others.

But can Coco really plow into that Snickers with you?

Should she really be licking that cheese dust from your fingers after you demolish that bag of Doritos?

Can she chew on that mountain of chicken wing bones that you shamelessly woofed down?

While "hilarious"...

…is it really safe for your dog to try at home?

These are the real questions and I’m here to help you.