Pumpkin dog biscuit recipe for Halloween

Halloween treats don't have to mean chocolate, sweets, or anything scooped out of a trick-or-treat bucket. Pumpkin is one of the safest, most useful seasonal ingredients you can put in a dog biscuit — it's naturally low in fat and calories, contains useful fibre, and most dogs genuinely love the taste. Baking a batch yourself also means you know exactly what's gone into it, which matters more in October than at any other time of year, when kitchens, hallways, and trick-or-treat bowls fill up with things dogs really shouldn't eat.

This recipe uses plain, unsweetened pumpkin — never pumpkin pie filling — along with simple pantry ingredients and nothing that could cause harm. It's straightforward enough to make with children helping, the biscuits keep well for days, and having a stash ready means your dog gets their own "trick or treat" moment every time the doorbell goes.

Below you'll find a full step-by-step recipe based on the vet-approved pumpkin biscuit that PDSA publishes for its supporters, a simple variation from Dogs Trust, guidance on safe portions, and — just as important — a clear list of what to leave out of the mixing bowl altogether.

Why pumpkin works so well as a dog treat

Pumpkin flesh is mostly water, with a useful amount of fibre and very little fat, which is exactly what you want in something a dog is going to eat several of during a busy Halloween week. It's easy to cook with, holds its shape well once baked into a firm biscuit, and has a mild, slightly sweet flavour that dogs tend to find appealing without any added sugar. Because it's a vegetable rather than a manufactured treat, you also have full control over portion size and ingredients, which is the whole point of baking your own.

The key word throughout this guide is plain. Plain, cooked pumpkin or plain tinned pumpkin puree with no other ingredients added is the only form that belongs anywhere near your dog's bowl. Tinned "pumpkin pie filling" looks almost identical on the shelf but is a completely different product — more on that below.

What you'll need

This recipe is adapted from PDSA's own pumpkin biscuit recipe, published as a vet-approved treat for dogs and cats. It makes around 20 small biscuits.

• 145g canned pumpkin, or pure pumpkin puree (not pie filling)
• 55g grated carrot
• 60g apple sauce — check the label carefully, as it must not contain the sweetener xylitol (sometimes labelled birch sugar), which is toxic to dogs
• 160g rice flour
• 25g oats
• A little plain flour, for dusting the work surface when rolling

You don't need any eggs, sugar, salt, or spice for this version — the natural sweetness of the pumpkin, carrot, and apple is enough. If your dog has a wheat sensitivity, rice flour keeps this recipe grain-friendly, but you can substitute a plain wholemeal or oat flour if your dog tolerates it and you're not concerned about gluten.

Method: step-by-step

1. Prepare the wet mixture

Heat your oven to around 150°C (gas mark 2). Blend or whisk the grated carrot, apple sauce, and pumpkin together until you have a smooth, thick puree. A food processor makes this quick, but a fork and a bit of patience works just as well for a small batch.

2. Make the dough

In a separate bowl, mix the rice flour and oats. Add the wet pumpkin mixture and combine until it comes together into a firm dough. If it feels too wet to roll, add a little more rice flour a tablespoon at a time; if it's too dry and crumbly, a small splash of water will bring it back together.

3. Roll and cut

Dust your work surface with a little plain flour and roll the dough out to around 0.5cm (roughly a quarter of an inch) thick. Use a Halloween-shaped cutter — pumpkins, bats, ghosts, whatever you have — to cut around 20 biscuits. Re-roll the offcuts to use up all the dough.

4. Bake

Place the biscuits on a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper or non-stick liner. Bake for around 12 minutes, turning the tray or flipping the biscuits halfway through so they colour evenly. They should come out lightly golden and firm, not soft in the middle.

5. Cool completely before serving

Let the biscuits cool fully on a wire rack. They'll firm up further as they cool, and serving them warm can make them harder for your dog to chew comfortably.

A simple variation: pumpkin and peanut butter

If you want a slightly richer alternative, Dogs Trust publishes a pumpkin and peanut butter recipe that swaps some of the vegetables for sweet potato and adds peanut butter for extra flavour. Roughly, it combines cooked, mashed sweet potato, pureed cooking pumpkin, wholewheat flour, a spoonful of xylitol-free peanut butter, and just a pinch of cinnamon, formed into a dough, rolled, cut into shapes, and baked at around 200°C for 15–20 minutes until firm.

The peanut butter point is worth repeating on its own, because it's the single most common way well-meaning owners accidentally poison their dog at treat-baking time.

Always check the label every single time you buy peanut butter — even a brand you've used safely before can reformulate to include xylitol without much warning on the front of the jar.

Portion sizes: how many can your dog actually have

Homemade biscuits are still a treat, and treats should never make up more than around 10% of your dog's daily food intake. PDSA's own guidance for its pumpkin biscuit recipe suggests dogs under 15kg can have one biscuit a day, and dogs over 15kg can have two, with their normal food ration reduced slightly to account for the extra calories. Cats, if you're making a batch for a multi-pet household, can have half a biscuit.

If you're baking treats regularly through October and want to keep a closer eye on your dog's overall calorie intake — especially if they're already on the larger side, older, or managing their weight — our Pet Calorie Calculator is a quick way to work out roughly how many calories they need in a day and how much headroom that leaves for treats like these.

Ingredients to leave out completely

This is the section that matters most for Halloween specifically, because it's the one time of year when genuinely dangerous ingredients are more likely to be sitting out on a kitchen counter or a trick-or-treat bowl by the front door.

• Pumpkin pie filling. This is not the same product as plain pumpkin puree, even though the tins can look almost identical. Pie filling is pre-sweetened and typically spiced with nutmeg and sometimes cloves, and some brands include xylitol. Always check you're buying "100% pumpkin" or "pumpkin puree," not "pumpkin pie mix" or "pie filling."
• Xylitol. This sweetener is extremely toxic to dogs even in small amounts, causing a rapid, dangerous drop in blood sugar and, at higher doses, liver damage. It hides in more places than most owners expect — some peanut butters, some apple sauces, baked goods, sugar-free gum, and low-sugar treats. Always read the full ingredients list, not just the front label, before using any shop-bought ingredient in a dog treat.
• Chocolate. All chocolate contains theobromine, which dogs can't process the way we can, and it's harmful — potentially fatal in the wrong amount — regardless of whether it's a "human treat" left in a bowl by the door or festive chocolate decorations on a Halloween cake.
• Raisins and grapes. Sometimes used in seasonal baking or handed out at Halloween in small "healthy" snack packs, these can cause kidney failure in dogs and should never be included in a homemade treat or left within reach.
• Large amounts of cinnamon or nutmeg. A genuine pinch, as in the peanut butter variation above, is generally fine in a recipe designed for dogs, but nutmeg in particular is best avoided altogether, and cinnamon should never be added in the kind of quantity you might use in a batch of human pumpkin cookies.
• Cooked bones and carving offcuts. If you're carving a pumpkin for Halloween decorating at the same time as baking, keep the raw pulp, skin, and any stringy fibrous bits away from your dog — they're not toxic in the way chocolate is, but raw pumpkin skin and large pieces are hard to digest and can cause an upset stomach or, rarely, a blockage.

If you're ever unsure whether something in your cupboard is safe to give your dog, our Can My Pet Eat This? tool is a fast way to check before it goes anywhere near a mixing bowl or a treat jar.

Common mistakes when baking pumpkin treats

A few things trip people up more than anything else:

• Grabbing the wrong tin. Pumpkin puree and pumpkin pie filling sit next to each other on the same shelf every autumn. Read the label twice.
• Assuming "sugar-free" peanut butter is automatically fine. It's the opposite — sugar-free is exactly where xylitol turns up most often.
• Rolling the dough too thin. Very thin biscuits burn quickly at the edges before the centre is properly cooked through; aim for the thickness given above rather than paper-thin.
• Serving straight from the oven. Let biscuits cool fully. Warm treats are more tempting for dogs to bolt down without chewing properly.
• Over-treating. It's tempting to hand out extra biscuits during a fun baking session, but stick to the daily guidance above, particularly for smaller dogs.

Storing your pumpkin biscuits

Because there's no added sugar or preservative acting as a barrier, homemade pumpkin biscuits don't keep quite as long as a shop-bought treat. Store them in an airtight container in the fridge, where they should stay good for about a week. For a longer-lasting batch, freeze them in a single layer on a tray first, then transfer to a freezer bag once solid — they'll keep well for a couple of months and defrost quickly at room temperature.

Other Halloween hazards worth knowing about

Baking safe treats is one part of a dog-friendly Halloween, but it's worth thinking about the wider evening too. Sweets and chocolate left in bowls by the front door, or dropped by trick-or-treaters on the doorstep, are one of the most common reasons dogs end up needing emergency vet treatment in late October. Sweet wrappers themselves can also become a choking hazard or cause a blockage if swallowed, separately from whatever they contained. If you're expecting trick-or-treaters, it's worth keeping your dog in a separate room with the door shut, both to stop them helping themselves to the sweet bowl and to reduce the stress of a stream of costumed strangers at the door — plenty of dogs find the noise, masks, and unfamiliar smells more unsettling than exciting.

When to see your vet

If your dog manages to eat chocolate, anything containing xylitol, raisins, or a large amount of pumpkin pie filling, contact your vet or an emergency vet line straight away rather than waiting to see if symptoms appear. Signs of xylitol poisoning can include vomiting, weakness, wobbliness or lack of coordination, tremors, or collapse, sometimes within as little as 30 minutes of eating it. With chocolate, the risk depends on the type and amount eaten relative to your dog's size, but a vet or the emergency line will be able to talk you through it based on what and how much was involved. It's always better to call and be told it's nothing to worry about than to wait and find out otherwise.

*This is general guidance, not a substitute for advice from your vet, who can assess your individual pet.*

Sources

• PDSA — homemade pumpkin pet treat recipe and feeding guidance (pdsa.org.uk).
• Dogs Trust — pumpkin and peanut butter dog treat recipe (dogstrust.org.uk).
• American Kennel Club — Halloween food hazards for dogs, including chocolate, xylitol, and raisins (akc.org).
• Vets Now — xylitol toxicity in dogs: sources, symptoms, and emergency advice (vets-now.com).