Belcando Finest Grain-Free review

A Good result, sitting level with the typical adult dry food. Three of the four pillars come in at Good with nutritional balance at Average, the profile of a recipe doing everything competently. Named lead proteins, printed percentages, a full mineral panel and a carbohydrate load kept under the typical line are what earn it.

Ingredients, as declared: Lamb: Fresh lamb meat, liver, and lung (total: 40%); Amaranth (16.5%); Potato starch; Dried lamb protein (10%); Low-ash dried poultry protein; Pea flour; Hydrolysed poultry liver; Ground sea zooplankton (Krill, 2.5%); Dried yeast (2.5%); Poultry fat; Grape seed expeller; Dried carob bean gum; Dried, sugar-free sugar beet pulp; Chia seeds; Salmon oil; Sodium chloride; Potassium chloride; Dried herbs (total: 0.2%; Nettle leaf, Gentian root, Centaury, Chamomile, Fennel, Caraway, Mistletoe, Yarrow, Blackberry leaves); Yucca schidigera extract, Salmon: Fresh salmon (40%); Amaranth (16%); Potato starch; Pea flour; Meal from ocean fish; Salmon meal; Ground sea zooplankton (Krill, 5%); Dried yeast (2.5%); Salmon oil; Grape seed expeller; Dried carob bean gum; Hydrolysed salmon; Chia seeds; Dried, sugar-free sugar beet pulp; Dicalcium phosphate; Thistle oil; Dried herbs (total: 0.2%; Nettle leaf, Gentian root, Centaury, Chamomile, Fennel, Caraway, Mistletoe, Yarrow, Blackberry leaves); Potassium chloride; Sodium chloride; Yucca schidigera extract

One template sits behind both recipes. Each opens with a 40% fresh animal parcel, with amaranth at 16.5% in the Lamb or 16% in the Salmon, potato starch to bind, and krill ground in at 2.5% or 5% respectively. Amaranth is the interesting choice, a pseudocereal that brings along more protein than the cereals it replaces and no gluten at all, so the grain-free promise holds without leaning on a mountain of potato.

The Salmon recipe keeps its animal side entirely marine: fresh salmon, salmon meal, ocean fish meal, krill, salmon oil and hydrolysed salmon. For a dog being kept off chicken, beef and lamb it is a genuinely clean pick. The Lamb recipe is more of a blend, its lamb backed by unnamed poultry protein and poultry fat with salmon oil for the omegas, so it eats like lamb but is not lamb alone.

Across the shared analysis, protein converts to 27.8% of dry matter and estimated carbohydrate to 44.2%, a little tighter than the 46.2% typical for adult dry food. Chia seeds, desugared beet pulp and carob bean gum look after fibre and binding, and the 0.2% herb blend is the house signature.

The additive panel is identical on the two flavours, every trace mineral dosed in print with taurine at 500 mg alongside. Grape seed expeller features in both lists; it is the pressed seed left after oil extraction, valued as an antioxidant source, and carries none of the danger of the grape itself.

Both flavours sell at £5.26 a kilo, each in 4kg and 12.5kg bags.

Reckon on about 240 grams and £1.26 a day for a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition, derived from the usual maintenance estimate of roughly 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75).