Super Bowl Sunday is coming, and you know you have to get your snack game on. But don’t forget to include your four-legged friends in the fun! YouTuber Rosanna Pansino has the “paw”fect treat to entice your dog to join you in the football-themed festivities on Sunday, Feb. 12. It’s called a Barkuterie Board.
Rosanna Pansino Inspired by French Bulldogs
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know how popular charcuterie boards are for parties. The mix of meats, cheese, and crackers makes for an easy but chic appetizer to please big crowds. Well, now canines can chow down along with their parents thanks to Paisano’s creative recipe.
Pansino, who boasts more than 14.2 million subscribers on YouTube, was inspired by her two French Bulldogs, Blueberry Muffin and Coconut, and their furry friends. Pansino and some pals started a doggy play date. As the event grew, she realized that in addition to feeding the humans, the pups should get something to nosh on, too.
“I started throwing together a little charcuterie board for the dogs, and then it just started getting ridiculous and fun,” she told People.
Making Barkuterie Boards Mainstream
Barkuterie Boards became standard at the doggy play dates, but Pansino wanted to share this clever snack idea with the masses. So she partnered with Blue Buffalo to bring this tasty platter of dog treats to all pups ahead of the big game.
“My dogs love the food, and so I love the food. And I really love any treats that are high quality. They’ve got good ingredients. And I also like how cute they are. They’ve got a variety of flavors and come in some of the cutest little shapes,” Pansino said of the brand.
Blue Buffalo knows its target audience loves to eat. In a recent survey, the brand found that 97% of pet parents experience joy when they give their fur babies snacks. What’s more, 72% of pet parents planned to give their pup special treats during Super Bowl LVII.
So, without further ado, here’s how to spoil your ravenous pup during the big game!
How to Make a Barkuterie Board
Start your board with a ramekin filled with peanut butter at the center. This is the “dip.” Then build out from there, using pet-friendly foods like apples, carrots, bananas, and green beans to fill in the board. Add dog treats as well. Pansino prefers Blue Buffalo’s BLUE Nudges Chicken Jerky Cuts, BLUE Nudges Grillers Steak, BLUE Bits Chicken, and BLUE Health Bars Bacon, Egg, Cheese.
Add variety to the board with treats and food of different textures and shapes. If you really want to go all out, you can use small cookie cutters to cut shapes out of food.
A word of caution: always ensure the foods you’re offering are safe for canine consumption. Avoid those that contain the artificial sweetener xylitol, which is toxic to pets.
And another word of warning: make sure you label your delicious-looking Barkuterie Board “For Dogs Only!” or your human pals might gobble it up before your pups can get to it! After all, the point is to help the dogs in attendance for the big game feel like they’re part of this sports party tradition.
“They feel included; they feel like ‘I’m a part of it too!’ And it just makes my heart happy, and I can feel that they’re happy,” Pansino said about her French Bulldogs’ reaction to the Barkuterie Board idea.
In addition to making your dogs’ day with the Barkuterie Board, you can help rescue pups enjoy some treats, too. For every purchase of BLUE Nudges Jerky Cuts Chicken during Feb. 7 – 13, Blue Buffalo is donating up to 100,000 packages of snacks to Helen Woodward Animal Center. Treat your dogs and some rescue pups this Super Bowl Sunday all at the same time! That’s what we call a win-win.