Butchers Variety Pack in Jelly Can: With Chicken & Liver review

Our Good band is where these cans finish, a step below the Excellent band the typical adult wet food reaches. The distance is mostly meat share. The named animals here come to half the tin, where the strongest wet recipes print a good deal more, and at 82 kcal per 100g these are light cans, so daily portions run large.

None of that is a mark against them. Protein still converts to 44.1% of dry matter and fat to 29.4%. Estimated carbohydrate is a low 13.5% of dry matter next to the category's typical 15.8%, which is what you would expect from a recipe with no cereal in it. Nutritional balance reads Outstanding and transparency Excellent, with protein and processing Average, so the honesty of the tin and its analysis both count in its favour.

Ingredients, as declared: British and Irish Farmed Meats (Chicken 46%, Liver 4%), Salmon Oil, Plant Fibres, Vitamins and Minerals, Chicory Root, MOS.

Every animal in the tin is named and given its own percentage under one British and Irish farmed heading. That is a good deal more than the category term labelling that dominates this end of the shelf. Chicken carries the bulk of it in all three recipes, with the second and third meats present in small, printed amounts.

Liver at 4% is the quiet workhorse of these lists. Organ meat is unusually dense in the trace nutrients dogs need, so a small share does real work. The label never says which animal it comes from.

Jelly style canning is what makes these lighter than the brand's loaf recipes. Moisture is declared at 83%, energy sits at 82 kcal per 100g, and the practical effect is a fuller bowl for the same calories, which some dogs and some waistlines appreciate.

The tail of each list is identical: salmon oil without a percentage, plant fibres of unnamed origin, then chicory root for its inulin and MOS from yeast cell walls, both prebiotics at trace level. The added nutrients come with numbers attached, vitamin A at 1250 I.U. per kilo and vitamin D3 at 250 I.U., vitamin E at 13mg, zinc at 20mg, manganese at 2.5mg and iodine at 0.5mg. Calcium is not printed, though ash converts to 11.8% of dry matter.

The simplest of the three, with chicken at 46% and liver at 4% and no second animal named. Since the liver is not tied to a species and salmon oil follows on the list, it is a one meat recipe in spirit rather than a strict single animal diet.

Sold as a case of 24 cans, each 400g.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition would eat in the region of 1024 grams a day, or two and a half cans. That takes daily maintenance energy as about 840 kcal (110 × bodyweight^0.75). Light cans mean generous looking portions, and plenty of owners top up a dry food with them.