Belcando Adult Lamb & Rice M-XL review

Good is where this food lands on our scale, and Good is also where the typical adult dry food sits, so this is a middle-of-the-field result rather than a poor one. Transparency reads Excellent on the strength of the named lamb and the printed percentages, and value comes out Good. Nutritional balance and protein and processing both settle at Average, since the rice supplies so much of the bowl.

Ingredients, as declared: Rice (40%); Fresh lamb meat, liver, and lung (total: 30%); Low-ash dried poultry protein (12.5%); Dried lamb protein (10%); Feed oatmeal; Grape seed expeller; Dried baker's yeast; Oatmeal residue meal; Chia seeds (1.5%); Poultry fat; Flaxseed; Hydrolyzed poultry liver; Sodium chloride; Potassium chloride; Dried herbs (total: 0.2%; Nettle leaf, Gentian root, Centaurium erythraea, Chamomile, Fennel, Caraway, Mistletoe, Yarrow, Blackberry leaves); Yucca schidigera

The order of the list tells the story: rice at 40% comes first, then the 30% fresh lamb parcel of meat, liver and lung. Fresh lamb carries a great deal of water into the oven and leaves most of it there. That puts the dried proteins in charge of what the finished kibble is actually made of, and here that means 12.5% poultry against 10% lamb. Protein converts to 25.6% of dry matter, with estimated carbohydrate at 49.1% against a typical 46.2% for adult dry food.

Lamb is a well-liked, easily digested meat and a sensible flag to fly, but this is a lamb-led recipe rather than a lamb-only one. The poultry entries never name a species, which only becomes a live issue if you are trying to pin down exactly which animals your dog eats.

Oats appear twice, as feed oatmeal and oatmeal residue meal, adding fibre and B vitamins alongside the rice. Chia at 1.5% and flaxseed bring plant omega 3s, and the 0.2% dried herb blend running from nettle to blackberry leaf is a house flourish at a token dose.

The added minerals come in standard inorganic forms with every dose printed on the label, which is a level of disclosure plenty of labels skip. Grape seed expeller looks odd on a dog food list but is the pressed antioxidant-rich seed residue, not the fruit dogs must never eat.

The going rate is £4.30 a kilo, in a choice of 4kg and 12.5kg bags.

A 15kg adult dog in moderate condition would get through roughly 246 grams a day, which comes to about £1.06, using the standard maintenance assumption of around 840 kcal (110 × bodyweight^0.75). Belcando's own table says 200 grams for a dog that size; let condition, not the chart, make the final call.