Dog Bone Bakery opens in Brewer

BREWER – There is a new specialty bakery in town creating gourmet goodies for Fido and Fluffy.

Dog Bone Bakery opened its doors on Center Street one month ago and is offering several hand-made pet treats including frozen chicken-flavored or peanut butter-flavored yogurts, banana bread “bark-day” cakes, pup pops for dogs, and tuna catnip treats for felines.

“I like to cook so I thought that making dog bones would be cool,” owner Amy Colford of Hampden said Thursday from behind the counter of her new business. “They’re all natural and there is no additives or preservatives, including sugar or salt. It’s stuff you’d have in your own kitchen.”

The pet bakery is the first shop in the area to offer its own line of treats, but is not the first business to make or provide locally made pet snacks.

Moose’s Almost Famous Dog Treats are made in Prospect, Dedham’s Peaked Mountain Farm creates Bite O’ Blue dog treats, and the owner of Groomin’ Board on Essex Street offers pre-made meals and treats created at her home.

A “Wipe your paws” doormat greets customers as they enter Dog Bone Bakery and those who enter choose their goodies from a deli-style counter.

Roxie, Keller, Prada, all Basenji African barkless dogs, and a Great Dane named Titan are Colford’s test dogs for the products she carries. She started baking treats for her dogs in 2003.

“They sample everything,” she said about her minty-fresh, Parmesan, chicken flavor and peanut butter dog bones. “I actually have to be careful not to give them too much. They like them all.”

The Brewer shop also offers a variety of pet supplies, and, Colford said, she’s looking for more locally made pet items to carry.

Milford resident Jane Hopkins, who said she likes to support local businesses, stopped by the shop Thursday to pick up some items for her pets.

“I’m taking them home to the critics,” she said, adding, “My pets are my children, and I like to give them the best.”

Moose’s Almost Famous Dog Treats, made by the mother-daughter team of Jesse and Jody Hart, are available at more than 20 local convenience stores, including R&K Market in Hampden.

“We’ve been making them for about 12 years but have only been selling them for the past year or two,” Jesse Hart said Thursday of her beef-flavored treats. “They’re extremely healthy for the dogs. They help keep the teeth clean, their bones strong and coats shiny.”

Two great English mastiffs, Chloe, 3, and Moose, 2, whom the treats are named after, inspired the mother-daughter team to start selling the pet snacks they were already making at home.

“They’re big dogs, and we didn’t want to buy treats,” Jesse Hart said. “Chloe is 200 pounds and Moose is the runt at 150 pounds. They eat a lot of them.”

Two years ago, Gail and Daniel VanWart, who operate Peaked Mountain Farm, created Bite O’ Blue dog treats using blueberries. The couple is selling the popular treats in half-pint containers “up and down the coast of Maine and beyond,” Gail VanWart said Thursday.

The idea to create wholesome blueberry dog treats came to VanWart after finding a Christmas present that was given to Preshus, her now deceased border collie who loved to eat blueberries.

“I came across a cookie cutter the kids gave the dog one Christmas,” she said. “We were trying to think of a unique project to use our unused blueberries, and we started making them. The dogs love them.”

Bangor residents Jessi Banks, owner of Groomin’ Board on Essex Street, also makes pre-prepared meals and treats for pets.