How to Make Liver Cake
This is the world's most popular homemade dog treat—and for good reason! It's incredibly simple to make, uses cheap, everyday ingredients, and your dog will absolutely love it.
Liver is easy to find in any supermarket (Morrisons is a great bet) or from your local butcher. The recipe calls for roughly 500g (about 1lb), but don't worry if your pack is a bit more or less—this recipe is very forgiving. If you don't have liver, you can easily swap it for other proteins like minced beef, kidney, heart, chicken livers, or even tuna!
This cake is perfect as a training treat, a special birthday cake, or even to sell at fairs. You can top it with cream cheese for a "frosting" or bake the mixture in a cupcake tray for individual pupcakes (check out my pupcake recipe for details).
For this recipe, you'll need a 9" cake tin. You can find one online here.
Equipment
- 1 9" Cake tin
Ingredients
- 500 g Liver (approx. 1lb, a standard pack)
- 2 Eggs
- 200 g Wholemeal flour (200g = 7 ounces)
- Splash of milk
Instructions
- Add the liver, the eggs and a splash of milk to a jug.
- And blend it. It should look a bit like a smoothie once done.
- Transfer the mix to a large bowl and add 200g (7oz) of flour
- Mix ingredients until it’s a thick sticky goo. You can add a bit more flour if it’s not thick enough. But it should be fine.
- Grease a cake tin with a little butter.
- Empty your mix into cake tin, making sure it’s level.
- Put cake tin into the middle of a preheated oven at 160ºC (320ºF/Gas Mark 3) and cook for about 45 mins.
- Right, it should now be cooked. Yummy!
- It’s easier to cut while it’s still warm.
- Cut into squares and fridge. Freeze what you won’t use in a few days.
- If your dog is like mine, she will have watched you the entire time.
Fab easy recipe :0) kept tripping over the dogs as they followed me round the kitchen. Have tried some in novelty cupcake bases to see how they come out. Bonus being my friendly butcher gave me the liver for free :0)
Thanks Ebony and wow that you can get liver for free!
Wow I made this for my dogs tonight.
They love it. So easy and cheap to make.
simply superb mate.my three dogs work wonders now thankyou!!!
Cheers Karl! Glad your dogs like them!
Is it ok to use plain white flour?
Any flour will work. Gluten free better still.
What kind of liver did you used?
Hi Monika!
I used pigs, but ox and lamb are just fine and you wont notice any difference except that Lamb costs a lot more.
Hi can I use chicken liver?
Hi Jamie. Great recipe, easy to make although it can get messy. My German Shepard drawls for these. Great treat!
Thanks Amanda!
This is a great and easy recipe my puggle Ralfy has been going daft since I started making it jumping up at the oven!!
Just a couple of questions how do I know when it is cooked and I have cut into bite size pieces about 1cm square how much would you reccommend per day?
Hey Mags! Thanks for you comments!
I go by how it browns at the top, it should be bready all the way through if cooked right.
1cm size bits seem very small. usually I cut them into 1 inch squares. Just give as you would with normal treats – a few a day.
Jamie
Hi Jamie, I’ve made this recipe several times now – my dog loves it. He’s a sighthound, a Galgo, not renowned for their re-call & obedience, but some of the liver cake shaken about in a plastic bag guarantees his immediate attention. So, I thought sending a thank you is in order, if a little late. You have a fascinating website, really interesting, entertaining & informative. I confess my attention was initially caught up as you’re in Bishopton & my other half has a cousin there. What a lovely part of the world. The dogs you walk are a lucky bunch. Keep up the excellent work. Best wishes, Janet Ratcliff.
Thanks Janet! I’m glad the liver cake helps. That’s interesting your other half has relations here. Do you know what street?
Jamie
Hi Jamie, hope you didn’t think I was being rude – I didn’t see this until I looked again for the recipe to make some more cake (dog training class tonight).
The relations live in Lang Avenue.
Keep up the good work
Janet
Made some today using lambs liver and potato flour (to make it gluten free) So simple and my dog loves it. A money saver indeed.
Thanks Jim. Send a pic if you got any left. But you are right, it is a money saver, I just bought 5 pig ears today for £5 – only have one left!
I go to butchers and get real pigs ears also pig skin/crackling and air dry in garage,the skin I cut into strips and make rawhide chews/doughnuts etc.If you in a nice hot sunny country hang outside to air dry.I get as much as I can carry when butchers is throwing out at night and keeps them going for months, any you don’t dry can be frozen till you are ready to dry. can be slowly dried in oven but if you like me I forget they are in the oven and only remember when the roast pork smell drifts upstairs at 2am and I cant remember if I switched off oven,
Hi Fiona!
Butchers round here don’t seem to be much better than supermarkets and anything not mainstream has to be ordered in at cost which is frustrating. Can I ask, how much do you pay for real pig ears? They are raw, yeah?
Jamie