You’re listening to Pet Life Radio.com

Arden Moore:  Welcome to the Oh, Behave show on Pet Life Radio. I’m your host, Arden Moore. Today our focus is the food bowl. That’s heaven on earth for dogs when the chow is delicious and nutritious. You know the canine nose, knows. So here to serve up some delicious advice and tips is the gal who’s at home in everyone’s kitchen and dog’s best friend. Yes, we are speaking of Emmy-winning and daytime television show host and chef extraordinaire, Rachael Ray. How cool is that? Hey, bone appétit Rachael.

Rachael Ray:   Thank you very much. That’s quite an introduction. Are you sure you’re talking about me?

Arden Moore:  Rachael is joining us today to share with us a great new line of premium, healthy pet food she’s created. It’s called Rachael Ray Nutrish. That’s an awesome name Rachael. I love it.

Rachael Ray:   I’ve had a dog, I’ve had a pit bull to be precise, collectively between my precious Boo and now Isaboo, for almost twenty years and I’ve always cooked for my animals. When Boo got older, I had to make her a barley and brown rice mix that I used to call my Boosotto. Very little meat in it. She had to have lots and lots of carbs but she didn’t like the flavour of them. So I’ve been cooking for my own animals for twenty years and we’ve always had food recipes for animals in our magazine. And we’ve done several specials on Food Network about places to go, coast to coast, who do a great job from small bakeries to independent dog food companies. So it’s something that I’ve always tried to be involved with. And at the same time, I’ve wanted to work with pet rescue, especially of course pit bull rescue and pit bull awareness, because of my own dogs. But locally there’s North Shore Animal League that does just a phenomenal job and such great work. It’s just a way...because 100% of my proceeds from Nutrish go to from single cases all the way up to large organizations like North Shore. So it’s just a great way to be able to, under one umbrella, give back to the community. And at the same time, offer what I feel is a fantastic product at a really decent price. Nutrish, when you read the label on our food, it reads like a menu, that you can read every single ingredient and feel great about giving it to your dog.

Arden Moore:  I’m actually drooling right as you speak. And we’re going to talk to Rachael more about dishing up some delicious meals and treats for the dogs right after this commercial break. So sit and stay. We’ll be right back with the show that promises to be yummo!

Arden Moore:  Welcome back to the Oh Behave show on Pet Life Radio. I’m your host, Arden Moore. Our special guest today is TV show host, best-selling author and my favourite title, pet lover, Rachael Ray. Welcome Rachael. Is Isaboo with you?

Rachael Ray:   She is. She’s home today. There’s a tiny bit of sun up in the living room so she found it and put her nose in the middle of it.

Arden Moore:  I got to tell you, I love pits. Pit bulls I say they are meaty cheeks. I have one of my friends has a dog that’s a pit bull named Estella. And when I go over to see her I always squeeze her little meaty cheeks and give her kisses. And I am so happy that you are letting people know that pit bulls rock.

Rachael Ray:   Oh, I’m so happy that you’re doing that with your show and letting so many people hear that. I’m a firm believer that there are no animals that are born mean or mean-spirited anymore than you can have people that are born evil. So when you see cities, and in whole states outlawing the breed, it just always just breaks my heart. I do so much on the show and in life to talk about these creatures that have enormous capacity for forgiveness and for love. You know, all of the Vic dogs, all of the dogs that have been electrocuted and literally abused almost to near death, all except one animal was re-trained and put into a loving home. Many of them with children. And I had one of Michael Vic’s pit bulls sitting in my lap on the show. And the sweet little animal did nothing but kiss me the whole time. And you know, Isaboo goes to school every day; she’s very well behaved and she’s never had a complaint. She’s just a little angel.

Arden Moore:  How old is Izzy now? How old is she.

Rachael Ray:   Izzy’s four. She just turned four.

Arden Moore:  Does she have any special tricks? I know she’s got the palate most dogs would crave for. What kind of special tricks do people

Rachael Ray:   Every night when we come home, we get down on our knees and Izzy puts an arm on either side and gives us a big old huge hug. She’s a very good hugger. And she likes to hug like a human does. She’ll wrap her paws around your neck like that and stand up on her hindquarters. And you know, she does very few other tricks but she’s so smart. She sees a dog on the television or somebody says something that sounds like Izzy, whether there’s a character on TV named Izzy and she’ll run around it and try to figure out where the dog went. She does sit and paw, touch and kiss and all that. She’s a cute little thing. She’s more than tricks. She’s just a little love.

Arden Moore:  Where did you get Isaboo and do you agree with me? I love their meaty cheeks. I don’t know. Jus that grin is just contagious. It’s almost like a Rachael Ray grin.

Rachael Ray:   Yeah, I love it when my baby smiles. She does have a lovely grin. And she has a very human look. Her brow...she looks like she’s very concerned and worried all the time. She looks a lot like Boo. When my Boo died, she passed away so suddenly, I was completely distraught. I thought that if I looked hard enough I’d find...I thought she must have jumped into another animal. I hadn’t slept in a few days and I thought it made sense to me. She just hopped out of her body. She must be somewhere. So I searched, gosh 2000 rescue sites and pit bull sites from all over the country, looking for a little puppy that looked like her. And this little dog had the same worried little look. She hadn’t even opened her eyes yet. She had a little Bindi dot on her forehead. A little dot right in the middle of her forehead. So I thought, “Well, that must be my Boo.” That’s why I named her Isaboo incidentally. My favourite name’s Isabella and Boo was my good girl so I combined the two. Isaboo. Ironically enough, she does love butternut squash.

Arden Moore:  Well there you go! Paws down!

Rachael Ray:   You never know!

Arden Moore:  Let’s talk a little bit about the Rachael Ray Nutrish pet food. Ever since the spring of ’07 people are, thank goodness, paying a little more attention to what they’re serving up for their dogs and cats and other critters. You say it on your show, what we put in our bodies goes a long way. The same thing for our companion animals. So talk a little bit, you don’t have to sound like a commercial but I really think you’re passionate about this. And you really are a dog’s best friend. So let’s talk a little bit about both the premium food and then a couple of the treats that are out there. I’ve got to say, and then I’ll shut up, my personal dogs favourite, Chipper and Cleo, they love the Grill Bites. I’ve got to tell you. They’ll do anything for Grill Bites.

Rachael Ray:   They’re adorable aren’t they? We call our little treats “booscotti”. I like the peanut butter and the bacon. You know, what I like best about the brand is that the way the food was designed is that they took all of the common ingredients, the most common ingredients from all of the recipes that we’ve done on the website and on the food specials. The peanut butter booscotti was literally based on the peanut butter booscotti that we made on Food Network. All of the ingredients for the beef and chicken lines come from food that I’ve been making for Boo or Isaboo or common vegetables that I figure that most all the dogs that I know have enjoyed. That’s how they put the ingredients together for us. And Isaboo was the dog that taste tested it.

Arden Moore:  Nice job!

Rachael Ray:   She likes her food nice and crisp and extra-crunchy. As I said, you can really read the labels like a menu. It just says, carrots, beef, beets. You can read every single thing that’s in it. It’s not words that you’ve never heard of or fillers. It’s food you would put in your own body.

Arden Moore:  I think the living proof is a happy dog named Isaboo. So you can get this almost anywhere or where’s it being sold, if I may ask?

Rachael Ray:   You can get it at Wal-Mart, a lot of pet stores and a lot of grocery stores. It’s out there. It’s waiting for you. And 100% of the proceeds goes, of my proceeds, goes directly to our animal rescue.

Arden Moore:  Let’s talk about that. It’s the rachaelsrescue.org. I want everybody to dash over there after the show. You’ve got four different groups that you’ve spotlighted.

Rachael Ray:   No, it’s not limited in any way. We’ve given to, all of the proceeds, the last I checked it was a while back, it’s over 375,000 so far, all of my proceeds go into a fund called Rachael’s Rescue. And we have individual dogs. Like there was a dog named Spirit that had been horribly beaten on the US border and the border guards saw it and went over to rescue the dog. It had parasites in its blood and needed all kinds of surgeries, we funded – I think it was over $2000 just in the first 24 hours of Spirit’s treatment. And that dog was adopted by the man that saved it. So we can help individual cases all the way up through the grassroots organizations, all pit bull organizations. We just gave Kathy Griffin a check the other day for a Pet Veteran Foundation. Some of the dogs are actual vets themselves. They take dogs and turn them into service animals for our men and women that suffer a loss of a limb during wartime. So of course, we’ve got a huge relationship with the North Shore Animal League. So we give to organizations big and small, all the way down to individual cases, individual dogs.

Arden Moore:  Wow. I’m really glad you’re unleashing a lot of love and help for everyone. Because as you know, sadly, about every ten seconds, a dog or a cat is euthanized at a shelter. And in these tight economic times, what we need is some sloppy kisses and purrs. Don’t you agree?

Rachael Ray:   Absolutely. It’s so hard. We’re in such a crisis and so many families lose their homes and they have no choice but to leave their animals behind because they just can’t afford to care for them anymore. It breaks my heart. That’s why this is really cathartic for me. Being able to get a quality product at a fair price out, that animals enjoy, that people can feel good about. And that every time you put it in the bowl, you’re helping to feed some other animals that are going through tough times.

Arden Moore:  That’s great. What is it when...I know you love to be in the kitchen and you whip up really quick dishes. I love that because you’re not one of these people that carefully measures everything out – it

Rachael Ray:   I don’t measure anything.

Arden Moore:  No! But you have kind of a spirit in the kitchen that I feel is very energetic and very contagious. But you’ve got to admit, dogs with their ability to smell. I mean, what do you enjoy doing better: making meals for us two leggers or preparing dishes for Isaboo and the four leggers?

Rachael Ray:   I think whatever you’re cooking, even something as simple as brown rice and stock or roast squash or sweet potatoes for your pup, if you cook it with love or cook it for people you care about, it’s a wonderful process that feeds you while you’re feeding them. It’s a very soulful thing.

Arden Moore:  I think you’re right. I actually wrote a dog cookbook with a vet nutritionist called Real Food for Dogs. And we made 50 recipes; two-thirds are for people too. So I’m going to send it to you and also get you to try –

Rachael Ray:   Please do.

Arden Moore:  Try Marvelous Mutt Meatballs. I need to put some OO on it, right?

Rachael Ray:   A little olive oil never hurt anybody. It gives you a shiny coat.

Arden Moore:  We are speaking with Rachael Ray. She has a new line of pet food out. It’s called Nutrish which is a delightful name. And you can learn more about this line by going to, what is it?  Nutrishforpets.com.

Rachael Ray:   Nutrishforpets.com.  Exactly.

Arden Moore:  And what’s coming up for Isaboo? Any new meals you’re planning for Isaboo?

Rachael Ray:   Izzy eats a little version of whatever we eat and it is coming to the end of squash season. I mean, you don’t want to make a big butternut squash in the summertime. So this week we’ve already got some squash in the house. And sweet potatoes are so filled with nutrients. They’re great for both people and your pup. So I’m going to be doing a lot of...Again, there’s risotto, or boosotto as I call it, is just terrific. I love making short-grained rice, mixed in with a little barley, keep adding stock, adding stock and then I add pureed sweet potato or pureed butternut squash to it. Absolutely delicious. Little sprinkle of cheese for the grown-ups and you’re good to go.

Arden Moore:  Now I know you’re great in the kitchen but I saw somewhere that you did some celebrity dog art. Richard Gere and Judge Judy and Cyndi Lauper. You did something that was – it

Rachael Ray:   Yeah. We were sent dog statues and had to paint them. So ours went in with a yellow cape armed with kitchen utensils and wearing little doggy goggles. So it was like Super Dog for Yellow Dogs.

Arden Moore:  When you’re walking around in New York and all that, is Isaboo pretty good on a leash?

Rachael Ray:   Isaboo’s terrific. She wears the Easy Walk which is a harness that attaches in the front, off her chest and keeps the puppy from pulling. She’s very well-behaved though. We had trainers come in, work with us when she was very young. And she’s been going to school since she was six months old. So they have playtime and naptime and all that. She’s very, very well adjusted. When we found her pawing a little too much, she she’s four now, but when she was one and a half, two, she would really get so anxious if she went anywhere near the park, the dog park and she’d pull. So we had a trainer work with her again. Take her on walks to the park to teach her, with a clicker and the treats. But she’s great now. She’s four now and come into her own, so to speak.

Arden Moore:  It sounds like the key here is consistency too. You’ve got a good rhythm going for her. Do you ever notice that sometimes trainers actually train us too?

Rachael Ray:   Absolutely. That’s why, especially when she was young, I think it’s very important for you to be there through the process. They’re running the course but they’re training us to train her. We were very much present for all of that. She associates it with us as much the trainer.

Arden Moore:  That sounds good. That sounds good. Is she going to be making an appearance soon again on your show?

Rachael Ray:   She comes by every once in a while and usually it’s a surprise to me. She comes to the building a lot but when she shows up on set usually my husband has conspired with my producers to surprise me with something or other. She comes frequently to the office. Once every couple weeks she’ll come by and say hallo. One of her best friends, Penny, she’s a little teeny tiny Boston Terrier, she looks like a mini Izzy, that’s one of her best friends, so she comes by to see Penny. Because Penny comes to work with her mom every day. So every once in a while she has to do a drive by. There’s a dog on the second floor, an antique dealer, named Bosco. She likes Bosco very much. So she comes and visits the office. But we try and make sure she goes to school at least three days during the workweek and one of the weekend days so that she stays in that socialized environment.

Arden Moore:  I was looking on your site and you’ve got some ardent fan mail coming from the Nutrish line; including this one gal that has a three-pound Yorkie who she says was the pickiest eater. So you’re saving Yorkies and little Chihuahuas...I love this Crusher and Bruce, are Chihuahuas that thank you very much. Ever notice that Chihuahuas always have to have tough names? Do you ever notice that?

Rachael Ray:   I know and they act like that. You know, you go to the doggy playground and you look it’s the little dogs that have the Napoleon complex. They’re always the bruisers on the playground. That’s what’s so great about the ingredient list on this. I mean, number one ingredient in beef and veggie is beef. Number one ingredient in chicken and veggies is chicken. You can read everything. I think that’s why it’s popular with picky eating dogs because it does smell like table scraps. It smells like people food.

Arden Moore:  Yeah, but you’ve actually worked with a veterinary nutritionist and everything on doing that?

Rachael Ray:   Absolutely. Just very, very cautious about that. Absolutely. Not just a vet, there’s a whole panel of them that go through this. Once we tweaked the formula they give us their opinion. We go back and forth until Isaboo says it’s good.

Arden Moore:  Have you thought about anything for the feline world yet? Are you going to check it out with the dogs first?

Rachael Ray:   Yes. I would love to see that happen. I have a good friend who runs a shelter and he has a thousand cats in the shelter and he runs a second business just to keep money for his shelter. My mom’s personally rescued 15 animals from my little property upstate. Had them spayed and neutered and put them back out. Has little kitty sheds for them, little cat shacks with little cat swinging doors, and she feeds them, cares for them. She has five that she brought inside and took them from being completely wild to making them her house pets. Just in my own family, we have 20 cats. So, yes.

Arden Moore:  Wow. Wow. You know what? So when you were growing up you always had fur around you, didn’t you?

Rachael Ray:   My sister brought home the first kitten. It was a little abandoned cat she found at school one day. And she came home with her big brown eyes and said, “Oh please!” So we’re all suckers for our furry friends.

Arden Moore:  Our special guest today has been Rachael Ray. We’re very happy she could be on. She has unleashed a new pet line called Nutrish. She’s benefiting a lot of great causes out there. You’ve got to go to rachaelsrescue.org. And I also want to thank my cool producer, Mark Winter. He makes this show happen every week. So on behalf of Pet Life Radio, Rachael, I’m very happy you could be a guest on our show.

Rachael Ray:   Thank you so much.

Arden Moore:  Paws and applause to you. Give a hug to Isaboo I’ll send the book to you. Really appreciate it. Good luck with this.

Rachael Ray:   Thanks so much.

Arden Moore:  Wow! What a great show. I’m so glad we had Rachael Ray as our guest. I want everyone to dash out to rachaelsrescue.org and check out all of the things she’s doing for our tail wagers. And remember her name is spelled R-A-C-H-A-E-L, as in Rachael Ray. This has been a great time. I’m glad she’s doing great work for pets. And again, check out the pit bulls. I think they’re marvellous and so does she. Isaboo is the poster dog for good behaviour when it comes to pit bulls. And again, check out her new line of pet food. It’s called Nutrish. Which is perfect for her. Perfect name. And she’s really picky about what she puts in the food bowl, just like we should be. So that’s how you can learn more about that by going to nutrishforpets.com. So until next time, this is your flea-free hosts delivering just two words to all you two, three and four leggers out there – Oh, Behave!