Hi Amanda,

that is a good question, isn’t it? And the answer depends on whom you ask. Some might tell you, yes, definitely, others will shout out, OMG please don’t do that.

Here is how it is with food, whether for ourselves of for our dogs.

The best food you can offer is
– biologically appropriate (there are arguments about what is or isn’t biologically appropriate for dogs)
– as fresh and wholesome you can offer (some argue that ingredients don’t matter only nutrients matter; well both do matter)
– as little processed as possible
– with as little stuffs that don’t belong into food as possible
– as natural and organic as possible (again, there are arguments that it doesn’t matter but it doesn’t make sense that it wouldn’t)

I think Dr. Becker summarized it fairly well in this article:
http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2010/07/21/13-pet-foods-ranked-from-great-to-disastrous.aspx 

Again, there are arguments whether raw is best or cooked is best. (there are arguments about every single aspect of what to feed our dogs)

Advantages of raw: minimal loss of nutrients, high digestibility
Disadvantages of raw: possible contamination with bacteria
a) the risk seems higher to people than the actual dog(s)
b) can be controlled with exercising good food safety

Advantages of cooked: minimizing risk of bacterial contamination, good digestibility (even better with some ingredients such as veggies; whether raw or cooked protein is better digestible is also debated)
Disadvantages of cooked: loss of nutrients

Advantages of making your own food (raw or cooked): full control over ingredients
Disadvantages of making your own food: if not done properly, there is a risk of nutritional imbalances

These days you can find commercially available diets for any type of food you wish to feed, whether it’s raw or cooked. Advantage of doing that is that you can find manufacturers who have complete and balanced formulations. Disadvantage is that you don’t control the ingredients directly and have to take the manufacturer at their word on what they put in and where they sourced it. There are some reputable manufacturers out there for both raw and cooked diets.

How much you should feed your dogs depends on your dogs (not only their weight but also their age and activity level). There are calorie calculators out there.

Depending on what you have available where you live, home prepared (whether raw or cooked) can be cheaper than commercial. Or not. Depends on whether you can source from farmers, co-ops etc.

There is the work that goes into making the food.

MOST IMPORTANT ASPECT, though, is that if you are going to make your own food, whether raw or cooked, is to make sure it is COMPLETE AND BALANCED. This can be best and easiest achieved by
a) working with a nutritionist
b) working with a supplement such as BalanceIT
c) acquiring some good recipes (but whatever you’re going to make will need to be supplemented, AT LEAST with calcium source) Vitamins and minerals may or may not have to be supplemented depending on the ingredients you’d use.

As for myself, I used to home-cooked for Jasmine for a long time. It worked very well for her. I DID use a supplement designed specifically for balancing home prepared diets (in Canada we have Hilary’s Blend, which I have been using). With Cookie, she decided to “switch herself to raw” on her own (she is an avid hunter) so I figured who was I to argue and I’m now feeding her raw. For the time being I use mostly commercially prepared frozen raw with the odd fresh home prepared raw such as during hunting season. So she’d get a whole rabbit, for example.

I think reading the above article I linked to should give you a good idea how to improve your dogs’ nutrition and where to start.

Please do not forget the COMPLETE and BALANCED bit.