Frozen lick mats for summer road trips and car shows

Car show season around Malvern means long stretches of standing in a parking lot while people look at hoods and wheels, and our tester dog Ella has been to enough of them in the back of our red car to have opinions about how to wait. A frozen lick mat is one of the better ways to buy her twenty quiet minutes in the shade.

It is a low effort trick for a high effort day. You pack it before you leave the driveway, hand it over once you park, and get a stretch of quiet while you actually look at the cars you came to see instead of managing a bored dog on a leash.

Why freeze it at all

A lick mat at room temperature gets finished fast. The same mat, frozen solid, takes a lot longer to work through, since a dog has to melt and lick their way down through the layer instead of just lapping it up. That extra time is the whole point on a long wait at a show or a rest stop.

Packing a mat before you leave the garage

Do this the night before if you can. Spread a thin layer into the ridges, crumble in a freeze-dried treat or two, cover it loosely, and lay it flat in the freezer. Covering it keeps other freezer smells from creeping in, which matters more than you would think once you have watched a dog turn down a mat that picked up last week's chili.

Lay the mat flat rather than propped at an angle, so the base sets evenly across the whole surface. A mat frozen on a slant ends up with one thin, quick-to-finish edge and one thick edge that takes forever, which is not the balance you are going for on a long wait.

Why freeze-dried treats travel well for this

One reason we like pairing our treats with a road trip lick mat is that freeze-dried treats do not need refrigeration. You can carry a bag in the glove box or a cooler bag and add fresh crumbles to a mat once you get to the show, without worrying about anything going bad in a hot car over the course of an afternoon.

That also makes them handy on their own, separate from any mat at all. A small resealable bag of beef liver or chicken feet crumbles rides along fine in a glove box for weeks, ready whenever a wait turns out longer than planned, which at a car show it usually does.

Where to actually give it to your dog

Shade first, always. Put a towel or a mat under the lick mat rather than setting it straight on asphalt, since pavement in direct sun gets hot to the touch fast in summer. A tailgate in the shade, a folding chair's shadow, or the shady side of the car all work better than open pavement.

Bring water along too, since a frozen mat is not a substitute for it. Set a bowl down next to the mat so your dog can go back and forth between the two as the mat melts and the afternoon goes on.

In the Toys aisle

The lick mats themselves are SodaPup's, shipped to you directly from Longmont, Colorado through Shopify Collective. Not every mat is built the same way, so check the product page for whether a particular one is meant to go in the freezer.

What goes on the mat is still ours to answer for: our freeze-dried dog treats hold up fine in a hot car and ship separately from our kitchen in Malvern, Pennsylvania.

Questions

How far ahead should I freeze a lick mat before a trip?

The night before is plenty for most mats. If you are packing light and short on time, even a couple of hours in the freezer will firm it up enough to slow a dog down.

Will freeze-dried treats stay crumbly after being frozen on a mat?

Mostly, yes. They soften a bit once they thaw against a wet base, but they hold their shape well enough to stay identifiable, rather than dissolving into the mix.

Is it okay to give my dog a frozen treat when it is hot outside?

Supervise play and size up for strong chewers. If something looks wrong, stop and call your veterinarian.